Tim, Eric and Zach Galifianakis made a three-part viral video for Absolut Vodka that is very funny. [07 Aug 2008|02:51pm] fishwithissues Ok, content! Time to leave the nest! No more eating mom's vomit! Fly! Out into the big world! 1 comment|post comment

Oh look, a meme [07 Aug 2008|02:57pm] jessiehl [ mood | amused ] I got this one from nakki. It looked amusing. I am so incredibly NOT surprised by the result. ( Cut for large image ) 2 comments|post comment

Ring Ring Ring Ring Ring! [07 Aug 2008|11:14am] tablesaw The Olympics have started! Yeah, I know, it's just prelim matches, but still! I'm annoyed that I forgot to set the DVR for more of the early soccer games. Speaking of, just now, I was watching the end of the Argentina–Ivory Coast game on Telemundo, and I had to use the restroom. Of course, shortly after I did, I heard "GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOL!" And I was really disappointed, because I didn't think I'd make it back to the TV in time to even see the replay. And then I remembered: DVR. I don't really watch much sports outside of the Olympics and the World Cup, so this is really the first time I'm going to be using DVR functions for watching sports. I got to go back, watch the goal, then speed through the rest of the game as one team strategically (but monotonously) controlled the ball. On the other hand, recording things with the DVR is a pain. I don't know if it's NBC's inept programming or Time Warner's inept scheduling, but the sports are listed in blocks. Twelve-hour blocks. So I can't just record the events I want. But most importantly, every four years, I get to indulge in Olympic Crushes. Let's take a look at who I reported last year: Amanda Beard. I really don't like the blonde look, so I don't think this crush will carry over. Amy Taylor. It looks like Australia's women's team didn't qualify, and she left in 2004 anyway. Jodie Henry. Apparently, a chronic injury forced her to bow out of this year's olympics. Lisa DeVanna. Another Aussie that won't be at the games. Jennifer Parilla. Another nix; the U.S. trampolinist is Erin Blanchard. Loudy Tourky. Now Loudy Wiggins, this is yet another Aussie that won't be returning. Kim Rhode. Finally, somebody coming back. Jackie Frank. The US team is back, but Frank (now De Luca) isn't the goalie anymore. Yelena Isinbayeva. Still dominating the pole-vault. So after all that, I'm only carrying the torch (BADUMBUM!) for Rhode and Isinbayeva. Clearly, my passion for the Australian teams couldn't last. I'm sure I'll keep posting about Olympic crushes all through the games. In the meanwhile, here's the first crush of the 2008 games: Becky Kim, U.S. Synchronized Swimming ThuNYTX: 7:45 (one error); ThuNYSX: 9:15; ThuLATX: 7:30. 1 comment|post comment

Tyler Hinman to appear at First Annual Bay Area Crossword Tournament! [07 Aug 2008|10:08am] npl [cartman94501] I have just heard from Tyler Hinman, four-time ACPT champion, who lives in the Bay Area now. Tyler first won the tournament in 2005 at the age of 20 and was the youngest-ever winner. He's also the only person ever to win four times in a row. Tyler has graciously volunteered to serve as a celebrity judge at the First Annual Bay Area Crossword Tournament, to be held in Alameda on Saturday, September 13 (just six weeks away!). If you haven't mailed in your registration, now's a great time. It's just $15 in advance, and you can download the registration form here. All proceeds benefit the California Dictionary Project, a very worthy literacy-related charity whose mission is to get a free dictionary into the hands of every third-grader in California. I've seen the dictionaries, and they're excellent. So if you're a crossword fan, or have always wondered how well your crossword skills compare to those of your peers, come to Alameda on September 13, meet Tyler Hinman, support a worthy cause, and find out! post comment

[07 Aug 2008|01:00pm] lepetitchatmort and all my nerves are filled with some kind of energy post comment

[07 Aug 2008|10:30am] thedan WedNYT - 5:15 clean ThuNYT - 8:02 with one error Clearly this is not a crossword day for me. 1 comment|post comment

Guard your bumper, John... [07 Aug 2008|10:07am] saxikath [ mood | amused ] Via ceo, a rather surprising bumper sticker. Or rather, a surprising bumper sticker location. 1 comment|post comment

[07 Aug 2008|09:00am] thedan Have any new hobbies? Mine is posting Adult Swim talks from Comic-Con. Here's the Robot Chicken panel, which includes the surprising revelation that Breckin Meyer is totally awesome. post comment

[07 Aug 2008|04:37am] earthdotprime IBM, did you seriously introduce a new T series in between me deciding on the T61 and securing funding? Are you KIDDING me?? Die in a fire. Please. 3 comments|post comment

[06 Aug 2008|11:49pm] gotspit [ mood | amazed ] If you have an XBox 360 or have access to one you owe it to yourself to play Braid. It's hauntingly surreal and gorgeous, visually arresting. It is strangely evocative in its simplicity. It features some of the most creative use of relatively simple game mechanics I've seen in a long time. And, on top of that, it's a puzzle platformer with intense overtones of Super Mario Bros.. I just played through the demo and it's great. Do it! 1 comment|post comment

twitter for today [07 Aug 2008|02:33am] laura47 I twitter! twitter with me! 10:30 at work. sleepycakes. # 11:39 one of those really clarifying and edifying meetings. but now that i'm not talking to someone, my brain is sleepy. time for stimulants. # Automatically shipped by LoudTwitter post comment

Books That I Have Not Finished Lately [06 Aug 2008|09:36pm] maga_dogg de Quincey, Confessions of an English Opium Eater. Boorish, in the manner of a second-rate thinker and third-rate wit; rambles inconsequentially, and occasional levity makes it no less pompous. I have been trying to finish this for about four or five years, and keep abandoning and restarting. There may come a point where a great vista of the Romantic imagination opens up and I am left in awe, but as yet there is no sign of it. Whenever Jacq sees me reading it, she asks "So has he eaten any opium yet?" This time I have actually got to the point where the answer is yes, which is rather more than I managed on previous attempts. Evelyn Waugh, Brideshead Revisited. I have read Decline and Fall, Black Mischief and Put Out More Flags; in my third-year Aesthetics classes, which always had an undercurrent of proving oneself well-read, my tutor opined that BR was Waugh's most popular and worst book. I can see why; Waugh allows himself a greater degree of sentiment and wish-fulfillment than elsewhere, and wallows in it longer. Donna Tartt, Secret History, which I enjoyed thoroughly, obviously relies on it but is rather better. Further, I am profoundly incapable of giving a crap about the angsty gulf between Anglo-Catholics and Catholic Anglos. Neil Shubin, Your Inner Fish. Probably would have been quite interesting if I hadn't recently slogged my way through a rather more technical work on embryology and evolution. Since aforementioned slogging was slow, difficult and caused my brain to make painful clunking noises, it would probably have been better to read Shubin instead, but still. 1 comment|post comment

[07 Aug 2008|12:56am] earthdotprime So, I leave in a week. I've tried so hard to clean up around here, but i still have SO MUCH STUFF everywhere. I've sold all the books/cds/movies I can back to the used bookstores here in town, and the library isn't accepting donations right now. Books Through Bars (despite being a block away from my old haunt) isn't really interested in what I've got (mostly fiction and sociology) , and I'd rather not donate them to FOLUSA since they're just going to sell them online anyway. I've listed everything I've got left on half.com, but it's not really moving. So I'm posting the link here. I'd much rather send these books out to someone who I know will at least read them, if not give them a loving home - ignore the prices, just message me here and I'll get 'em out to you for, like, cost of shipping/envelopes? I just can't throw away books. It feels wrong. 6 comments|post comment

[07 Aug 2008|12:40am] earthdotprime it is only barely starting to hit me just how soon this whole thing is starting. This is my last Wednesday night here, til at least December. (not that Wednesday were every anything special, but Last Things make me sit up and take notice.) I tried to get lost on my way home. Even in the dark, I couldn't do it. I pulled into the parking lot of my preschool, which has been explanded to take up the entire playground. My oldest cousin had his birthday party there, once. My aunt strung a pinata up from the monkey bars, in one of those deathtrap wood/metal playgrounds that no longer exist. woodchips everywhere. I was right underneath of it when it broke, and was crushed under 7 of his closest friends, all older, bigger boys. It hurt. All I got was a purple LifeSavers marker. There was a girl with brown, curly hair, that wore a fading lavender knee length parka in the fall. She pulled my hair and called me names, but our parents thought we were friends. Mr. Yuck taught us not to eat poison in a puppet show in the gym. The gym was really a classroom with a few mats and old gym equipment on it. Preschool gyms have a distinctly different smell than Elementary school gyms, or real gymnastic gyms. The music room was where we took our school photos. it was downstairs, down a slanted hallway, across from my middle cousin's classroom. Sometime I had to stay after school and wait with him. The carpet smelled weird and we watched Rikitikitimbo over and freaking over again. I didn't know anyone. They've renovated I don't know how many times. There's an addition on the building, and I don't think any of the classrooms smell like anything besides chldren and their parent's money anymore. It's the most exclusive preschool in the suburbs, and parents put their kids on a waiting list pretty much as soon as they concieve. They sell window stickers for parent's cars. In Colorado, I will have to officially change my state residency to a place other than Pennsylvania, claim to live at an address that is not permanent. That I did not grow up in. That does not have a basement full of memories, a hallway full of battlescars. I know I need this change, to grow, to grow up. But I can't help but start to miss eveything I'm leaving behind. 4 comments|post comment

Group Participation Post [06 Aug 2008|09:10pm] lpsmith I'm back from vacation! I had a lot of fun, but first things first. I have to know what was in ( this truck ) 4 comments|post comment

[07 Aug 2008|12:22am] thedan Courtesy of ennirol: Hamlet for the Facebook generation. Good stuff. 2 comments|post comment

[06 Aug 2008|09:03pm] madcaptenor Did you know that Hootie and the Blowfish still exist? (Let's not get into why I know this.) 5 comments|post comment

I am so tired. [06 Aug 2008|08:47pm] ko Ever since I started feeding Ms. Chewie wet food, she's become so much more active!! AND VOCAL!!! I'm not sure how I feel about the vocal part. Like way *more* demanding. As in jumping on me at 6AM (even though I should get up anyway). For some reason, I thought that feeding her this food would make her healthier- and hence, quieter and mellower... but no- I've unleashed the beast and it's not ever going to be the same again. As far as food, I've definitely gotten a sense of what she does and doesn't like... I feel like she's getting more and more picky. I just stocked up on Chicken and Liver Pate. Supposedly it is healthy. I still worry about her sometimes, since she's become so bony. It's really weird- I just feel like it's not normal to be able to feel her bones, but... yeah. Oh yeah, and she jumps more and doesn't fall off my desk. All in a month! I don't know if I mentioned it, but I finally got the whole shoving-pill-down-her throat thing. Actually, I discovered that since her jaw is like wired shut- I can sneak the thing in the side and then get her to open it- and pray that it falls to the back of her throat. More often than not, we go through this whole cycle, where I get it in, she wraps her tongue around it and flicks it out while keeping her mouth closed as much as possible. It's amazing. And then we do it again. I'm actually quite fascinated about how dextrous she is with her tongue. Like... I can't do that.  Her little teeth are very cute. I wish my teeth were cuter. Anyway- I think she's gotten the message that I'll let her go and have food if we get it over with, so all in all- it's okay. Today was kind of a bummer- but then again, it was kind of stormy and I have a headache. I've realized that I can no longer live without running. It's the 4th week and it's in my system and I can't function properly if I don't do it in the morning. Oh... it's probably because I've been busier than normal, but I'm so glad that it's keeping me sane. Ah- I have so many things planned for the rest of August. I just wish I could transport MA-to-WA for a while. 2 comments|post comment

[06 Aug 2008|08:19pm] ocschwar Move aside, shallow phillistine. With your withered brain and shrunken heart, you cannot comprehend the depth of our torment. post comment

Awesomeness in comic strips. [06 Aug 2008|07:57pm] saxikath Today's "For Better or For Worse" is wonderful. (It's set in Canada, for context.) 2 comments|post comment

books sucking attention away from work [06 Aug 2008|02:51pm] bluepapercup For the first time in a while I'm engrossed in a book so interesting I can't put it down. I lingered over a solo book-reading lunch today for an hour and a half because I didn't want to part ways with my book. I'm about halfway through and totally ready to recommend the book. It's called The Man Who Found Time: James Hutton and the Discovery of the Earth's Antiquity by Jack Repcheck. It's an account of how one greatly under-credited and under-appreciated Scottish natural philosopher (they weren't called scientists yet in the 1700's!) discovered the idea of Deep Time, disproved the predominant Christian belief that the earth was about 6,000 years old, and irreversibly influenced the path of all geology to follow. Along the way I'm learning a great deal about Scottish history and about the history of written chronologies. Very interesting! It's not very technical with geology terms, and there is a glossary in the back. I would definitely recommend this book to scientists and non-scientists alike. An interesting book that also deals with the idea of Deep Time is Deep Time: How Humanity Communicates Across Millennia by Gregory Benford. His book touches on the idea of human communication persisting across thousands of years, our desire to communicate with alien species, and the impermanence of life. Very interesting, more than a little political, and a fascinating counterpoint to the rationality of Geologic Time. 2 comments|post comment

[06 Aug 2008|05:59pm] ocschwar Hmmm. post comment

Brooklyn Restaurant Exterior [06 Aug 2008|05:09pm] elainetyger post comment

[06 Aug 2008|04:59pm] madcaptenor When you get credit card offers in the mail, do you read them, just to see what companies would be willing to give you? I do. (And I've been getting a lot more credit card offers in the last couple months. I must be on some mailing list.) 6 comments|post comment

Puzzles Gone Wrong: a continuing series [06 Aug 2008|04:01pm] tahnan Once again, in the category of "unclear on the concept" puzzles, this one from Tanga. There's a lot wrong here—the solution method has problems, I think, and the pictures are too small to make out clearly. But the real issue...well, let the author explain. In case you don't want to go look, it's an odd-one-out puzzle, and the third and fifth lines are, respectively, pictures of: a helicopter, an airplane, a kite, an eagle; mouth, nose, chin, eyes. Now, from the answer: ( In case you want to solve it ) Dude. If you know that your puzzle is ambiguous, perhaps fixing it is a good idea. 9 comments|post comment

I've been tagged! [06 Aug 2008|02:51pm] saxikath history_grrl tagged me with an interesting survey meme. So rather than post any of the other things that have been rattling around my head, or researching Silurian life forms, I'll do this instead. ( Cut for the sake of your friends page. ) I'm not much of one for tagging, but I confess I'd be curious to see answers from dcltdw, amaebi, davehogg, and ghostowl. And several of those history_grrl already tagged. And anyone else who feels like answering. 3 comments|post comment

and ... a new blog [06 Aug 2008|02:06pm] toonhead_npl Move over, plus sign! It's ampersand's turn to shine! 1 comment|post comment

This entry brought to you by the letters C, A, P, S, L, O, and K. [06 Aug 2008|01:52pm] capsicumanuum Ugh. I'm still trying to get my license and registration transferred and then my resident's parking permit, so I used a visitor's parking permit last night. NOWHERE on either the permit nor the website did it specify where in the car to put the fucking thing, and Mike said it should go in the rear windshield, so that's where we put it. Lo and behold, I have a parking ticket this morning, because the damn thing goes in the front windshield. Also, I would really like to know who gave my current street address to Epsilon Theta? I do not recall updating my address on either the MIT alumni database or ET's own database, which means someone who I trusted enough to give my address to forwarded it to the house. I've also asked the ACO a couple of times to take me off the paper mailing list. How much clearer can I make myself? ET burned its bridges with me. Burned. Destroyed. Not even the charred remains of the supports left. No way to cross that river ever again. I do NOT want to receive email or paper mail from the house. Especially not when the person who hurt me the most is featured on the front fucking page of the newsletter. (This should not be taken to mean that I do not want to see friends of mine who are also ET alums. I distinguish between the house and the individuals who lived in it.) I have tried to put all that behind me, and have womanned up and acknowledged my own mistakes, and no longer bear any ill will to anyone in the house, but that does NOT mean I want to stay in contact with the fraternity, or to have those wounds reopened when I walk in the door and am completely not expecting an AMBUSH EMOTIONAL ATTACK. Srsly. And my boss is still insisting that my analysis is wrong b/c the response to a step input should be the same as the response to a ramp. AND THIS PERSON IS DESIGNING SATELLITES FOR A LIVING. I am a CRANKY bear today. 14 comments|post comment

Who's just turned 40? [06 Aug 2008|01:45pm] toonhead_npl It's someone many of you will recognize, he's been in many newspapers over the years, and even appeared on TV a few years back. And no it's not qaqaq. 3 comments|post comment

Majestic Dragon Episode Six [06 Aug 2008|01:00pm] fishwithissues We tied for 3rd (or 4th is that how it works?) at Channel 101:NY. And do yourself a favor and check out Anne Laplantine's 100% perfect parody of Madge Dradge. Pure pleasure. 4 comments|post comment

oh, right, there was a minor cliffhanger somewhere in there [06 Aug 2008|11:53am] queenof_sarcasm After an uncomfortable half hour (forty-five minutes?) of sleeping on an airport floor, I was subjected to a highly invasive search by the TSA, which involved swiping every item in my backpack and camera bag with those little cotton swabby thingies just to make sure they weren't cleverly disguised explosives. ("Ah, yes! It appears as if your green underpants with the monkeys on them are actually made out of C4! Thought you could hide that from us, eh?") The rest of the trip - the flight home, my swearing-in ceremony (which was amazing), playing with my dog, and flying back to Boston less than twenty-four hours later - passed without incident. (And they all lived happily ever after?) 3 comments|post comment

[06 Aug 2008|10:58am] thedan Fabulous Venture Bros. Comic-Con panel highlights are here. The bit from 3:43 to 3:03 (the timer counts backward) is priceless. I'm currently debating whether to drag myself to Boston for trivia tonight; either way, tomorrow I will be in town for lunch with Erin, seeing Pineapple Express at Boston Common, and then A Little Night Music at MIT. (It's not an actual G&S show, so it doesn't count as losing my MITGSP virginity. Which I will never do.) If anybody wants to join me for the movie or the play and is *not crazy*, drop me a line. Though I think the theater seats are reserved, so I'd need to do some finagling, since I already have a reservation. 8 comments|post comment

[06 Aug 2008|07:09am] nothings If you have an Xbox 360, download the demo of Braid from XBLA and give it a shot. It is pretty darn awesome. (Full disclosure: I worked on Braid at the very end, but I thought it was pretty darn awesome before that.) 2 comments|post comment

[06 Aug 2008|09:42am] madcaptenor I'm Paris Hilton and I approved this message. 3 comments|post comment

[IBARW] Red and Green and Mostly White. [06 Aug 2008|06:10am] tablesaw [ mood | okay ] I'm going to just start writing things for International Blog Against Racism Week (ibarw), and hope it all comes out in the end. I've been trying to say something about race for a while, but it's a bit difficult. See, I'm white, and my parents are both white. My mother's family is from Ireland, and my father's is from Mexico. Very few people in the United States seem to have a problem anymore in considering the Irish to be white. There's a whole book about how that happened. But the idea of being white and Mexican is too much of a mindbender for a lot of people. Part of that has to do with the idea floating around the American consciousness (including among enlightened, urban liberals) that brown people who speak Spanish are Mexicans.1 As someone who is not brown and does not speak Spanish, I am usually assumed to be Italian, with some people going so far as to try to convince me that my last name is a common Italian family name (it's not). It's hard to write about this because it's an issue I don't have a great handle on. I identify as white because, for better or for worse, it most accurately represents where I am in the racial power structure of the United States, my Mexican heritage notwithstanding. But when it comes to the complications to my identiy, I have a horribly obscured picture of the what and the how and the why. Recently, my father, who plans to retire to Mexico soon, threatened to sneak into the house to teach my future children Spanish. It didn't explain why my father, who had studied Latin American history as an undergrad, had let the bilingualism of my sister and me end with the smattering of words on Sesame Street, or why our education was left to to the U.S.-centric textbooks in our schools. I think that's a part of whiteness—the assumption that you don't have to do anything different. But however white my Mexican family is, being Mexican doesn't offer the same security in American whiteness. I can still remember the time I heard a child—playing a game of looking at people and imagining what they were going to do—happily exclaiming , "Look at those Mexicans, they're probably going to get drunk!" I mostly remember it because I said it; and because I remember the look on my mother's face (and my father's, in my memory, even though he was driving in the seat in front of me); and because I don't remember what they did to remedy the situation. These are questions I've meant to ask before writing about it publicly, but what the hell: I know my dad has a blog, and I know he and my mom read this one, and IBARW is supposed to open dialogues. Why not use it to open one in my own family? WedNYTX: 5:45; WedLATX: 6; WedNYS: 6:15. 1 In this usage, of course, "Mexicans" aren't necessarily from Mexico; they could be from anywhere south of the United States. They're named "Mexicans" not because of the country they're from, but because of the border they illegally crossed. 16 comments|post comment

A poll [06 Aug 2008|09:24am] wesleyjenn [ mood | curious ] Poll #1236062 Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All Had you heard of the Edinburgh Festival Fringe before I started talking about it? View Answers Yes, I've been. 2 (4.9%) Yes, and I know a bit about it. 20 (48.8%) Yes, but I didn't know anything beyond "it exists". 5 (12.2%) No. 14 (34.1%) This is something that is being discussed over here. I think my friends are probably an odd subset of the population (rather, I KNOW my friends are an odd subset. That's why I love you.) but I'm still curious. More on this topic once the poll is over... Please answer as truthfully as you can. 2 comments|post comment

Photos! [06 Aug 2008|01:26am] laura47 I can't ever quite decide how I want all my photos arranged. Next experiment: photo blog. friend me! laura47photos http://laura47photos.livejournal.com/ First post is from firefly 2008 1 comment|post comment

Futurama, Family Guy (the first time), Firefly ... the list goes on ... [05 Aug 2008|09:10pm] gotspit [ mood | busy ] Having never seen the last portion, I just watched through the entirety of Arrested Development with Peter. Aww, now it's over. :o{ What an amazing show. Work proceeds apace. Starting to get more social, but, still, the pool of people I know out here is awfully limited. dee doo deeeee dooo ... dee doo doot-doot doo 2 comments|post comment

Housestuff and *fest [05 Aug 2008|11:53pm] jackbishop [ music | The Beta Band, "Needles in my Eyes" ] It's been an exciting couple of weeks lately! I have done housestuff and gone to two major Events. Starting Saturday, there was an unusual event (but not an Event) I figured I had to make: the Schnitzelburg annual Dainty Competition, in which Schnitzelburg's quinquagenarians play a game to, essentially, drum up traffic for Hauck's general store. It was quaint but not actually terribly diverting, but I felt I had to go, thanks to the surprising discovery that my new home is in fact just barely inside Schnitzelburg (if it were a half a block further south, it wouldn't be). The real-estate listing defined the neighborhood as "Herman Depholzs", an appelation which Google suggests is unique to realtors. So, anyways, now I know my neighborhood, for what it's worth. Sunday was an actual event, Forecastle Fest, which had actually been going on all week, but I'd only bought tickets for one day. It was full of activism and music, so I got to listen to pitches for good causes and better music. The musical highlight of the day, for me, was the eclectically jazzy group Paradigm, the unexpectedly excellent New Mastersounds, and the ever-entertaining Brigid Kaelin. Ekoostik Hookah was the band which drew me in, but their set was uninspiring (and dead last, so I was tired). But I enjoyed enough of what I did to call the day a success. The main activism push was for sustainability, so their was tremendous campaigning againt mountaintop mining, presentations on solar and wind power and vegetable gardening and the like, and some booths on light rail and biking (which I can get behind). And a keynote address by Robert F. "I'm the last living member of my family, so I'm worth listening to" Kennedy, Jr. He had a good speech but not what I'd really call a rabble-rousing voice. And I left halfway through since they'd scheduled him opposide Brigid Kaelin. But, still, very much a good time and even fairly educational after dialing the activist fervor mentally down to normal enthusiasm. Monday was house inspection. No radon! No termites! Only minor repair work necessary, for the most part! The report basically mentioned trivial plumbing issues (two leaky sink traps), minor roofing issues (nail pops and a missing tab), and one serious issue, an overburdened electrical panel. We put all of these down as requests, although the most serious concern was really the electrical -- the others were fixable with little effort or expense. The seller agreed to the request, so things are still go. Tomorrow I meet with a mortgage broker. Oy. Tuesday was getting on a plane to Madison. And Tuesday through Sunday were Mathfest. Mathfest is the national summer meeting of the Mathematical Association of America, and it was a fun time. Project NExT helps a lot, since I have a pre-arranged network which can introduce folks to other folks. So I widenend my social sphere a bit. And then there were old acquaintences, among whom the most popular question was, "Where are your parents?" (a note: my mother is a high-school teacher involved in MAA governance and on several committees, and both parents helped run the 2001 International Mathematics Olympiad, so they're familiar faces at these things. It's a little less weird than it might be for an adult professional member being asked where his parents are). The answer to that question, incidentally, was and is "Italy". It was an excellent time in ways which by and large don't lend themselves to stories (attending sessions and workshops and suchlike). The most unusual event really was the Sun Dot Game Night, when a few of my fellow '07 Next Fellows arranged a night of boardgames and cardgames. It was successful enough that I was asked to do it again on the next two days. Another nice aspect of the trip is that Madison is a really cool city. It's got a huge farmers' market on Saturdays, a lot of really interesting restaurants, and is absurdly bike-friendly. And now I'm back. And that's the news, at least in brief. post comment

[05 Aug 2008|11:05pm] ocschwar post comment

[05 Aug 2008|10:44pm] lepetitchatmort Tonight, I am strangely sad. I'm don't know why, and I'm afraid to probe myself to find out. 4 comments|post comment

Ungoogleable. [05 Aug 2008|10:18pm] ocschwar Bet you can't find the source for this icon. 2 comments|post comment

now get outta here, you knuckleheads, I mean it [05 Aug 2008|09:55pm] derspatchel I'm halfway through the fourth episode of SNL season 3. Charles Grodin is host, and it's his first and only time on the show. It's pretty much a trainwreck whenever Grodin is on screen. During the week of production Grodin missed rehearsals (which they mention during the cold opening and his monologue) and his lack of preparation shows. He can't take his eyes off the cue cards, and his performance is so bad in some cases he stops sketches cold and ad-libs. However, this is combined with the intentional running joke of Grodin's complete lack of preparation, and at times you can't tell where the put-ons stop and Grodin's actual incompetence begins. In Samurai Drycleaner, for instance, Grodin accidentally reads Belushi's lines (which, while incomprehensible Japanese-ish mutterings, are apparently written on the cards for others' cues) and then breaks character to compliment John on his costume. Later on he stops a Killer Bees cold and asks "Can we do that over?" to which the cast tells him no, he can't, it's live. His only truly funny bit is dressing up as Art Garfunkel and sitting onstage with musical guest Paul Simon, trying to sing Garfunkel's high parts, only to have Art himself come onstage and Grodin stop it, take the wig off and do something else. It's pretty clear to me that the intentional jokes were brought about to cover the unintentional gaffes. Grodin was subsequently banned from the show (well, he was "never asked back", an act which puts him above the hordes of one-shot guest hosts who just, well, never hosted again.) I am eagerly awaiting the episode featuring Miskel Spillman, the 90-year-old winner of the "Anyone Can Host" contest, as it features what is arguably one of my favorite moments in Saturday Night Live history: Elvis Costello's bait-and-switch trick, stopping Less Than Zero ("I'm sorry, ladies and gentlemen, there's no reason to do this song here") and going into Radio Radio. Costello was banned as well for this stunt, but not so much for performing a song that NBC didn't want on the air as for running long, throwing off the show's schedule and really pissing off Lorne Michaels. Oh! But the most disturbing part of the third season? Well. You're gonna laugh, but it's the opening credits sequence. No, seriously. Stop that. NBC apparently wanted something new to kick off the show, replacing Edie Baskin's iconic opening sequence images with... titles generated from the then-brand spankin' new humongous Spectracolor billboard looming over Times Square. The little clusters of light bulbs, each cluster representing a pixel of color, must have looked amazingly new and space-age when it first came out. Remember the Astrodome scoreboard, with the amber lights and the "fireworks" and HOME RUN!! in big flashing letters? Well, the Spectracolor board kicked its ass because it could do fireworks in FOUR COLORS. I can't find any background information on the original board, but to me it looks as if the thing was controlled with an Apple II series computer, for the graphics closely resemble those you could make in the II's high-res mode. This does not, however, excuse the fact that the opening sequence is random, cheesy and hideous. Now, granted, the technology was brand new (this is 30-year-old tech we're talking about now) and the original Spectracolor sign is still a beloved memory of literally dozens of New Yorkers, but that doesn't mean the low-resolution images and transitions aren't, and weren't completely cheesy. It's as if Strong Bad had The Cheat design the titles for a pat on the head and a trophy cup full of Steak-Ums. Most horrifying of all are the attempts at photorealistic images of the cast members. Oh lord. Just look for yourself. ( blah blah blah, live from new york, blah blah blah... ) Someone must have really loved this sign. Or they signed a contract. Or something. I can see how the inclusion of the sign would've been a novel concept in 1977, but it's a real failure here. It was pretty clear that the graphics were, well, sub-par to say the least, and the credits sequence changed after the first episode. The second episode doesn't feature closeups of the castmembers' faces; instead, the camera is placed on the street looking up at the sign and each castmember walks by, looks at their image, and tries very hard not to laugh or punch someone. By the fourth episode the Spectracolor screen is still there but the caricatures are gone, the titles are in a larger, more colorful font, and the castmembers just interact with their names from the street (Murray tries to throw a shadow puppet onto the screen, and Gilda gets to eat her apple.) There have been many, many, many iterations of the SNL opening sequence, from the sequence of the 80s where the cast loomed over the New York skyline (computer-generated as well and designed by Charlex, the company who did the Cars' "You Might Think" video and the opening to "Mr. Wizard's World") to the single-shot POV a few years back (do a shot with Horatio Sanz! watch Tina Fey push you out of her way!) Some sequences have been bland or benign, others memorable and unique, but I think this one -- at least, the first episode's sequence -- takes the cake as the worst. Judging from the quick changes made to it, I see I wasn't alone in thinking this. 8 comments|post comment

[05 Aug 2008|09:38pm] ocschwar This concrete thing held me up in traffic on my wedding day. It was being loaded onto a truck, hanging by just one hook. The crane operator set it down on one end of the truck bed, and then slooooowly let it settle down. 3 comments|post comment

[05 Aug 2008|09:31pm] ocschwar Copley square yesterday. post comment

Monthly recap [05 Aug 2008|07:20pm] lno Still running. The marathon is in sixty days, which sounds like a whole barrel of HOLY CRAP to me. Earlier I set a goal of finishing in under five hours; while I still think I can do that, it's starting to feel like it may be a stretch goal. But then, man's reach should exceed his grasp, or what's a heaven for? The National Marrow Donor Program gave me a buzz this morning, letting me know that I'm a preliminary match for a 63 year old man with Hodgkin's lymphoma. The last I heard from them was five years ago when I was a preliminary match for a 23 year old with acute lymphoblastic leukemia. Tomorrow I should receive a package by Fedex containing four huge cotton swabs, and Thursday I'll drop that in the mail back to them. With any luck, I'll continue to be a match, and will end up helping this guy out. I'm looking forward to this for two reasons: one, out of six billion people in the world, I could be the best match to save his life, and two, hello Minnesota Statute 181.945 subdivision 2 which guarantees me 40 hours of paid leave for the purposes of marrow donation. Woohoo long weekends! We're now something like twelve and a half weeks into pregnancy, and the spawn has received a new nickname of Cheeto. Why Cheeto? Motherfucker loves Cheetos. The NFL season is coming around again, which means another year of 1on1 football, and another year of season tickets draining my wallet. Last year's first home game was against the Atlanta Falcons, and I had an 18 mile run prior to that. This year's first home game is against the Indianapolis Colts, and I also have an 18 mile run prior to that. Last year Adrian Peterson had a 60 yard touchdown reception. This year, I'm expecting at least the same if not more. Our backyard garden is freaking huge, and tonight we've got a pasta sauce going with tomatoes, zucchini, sweet peppers and celery. The celery didn't come from the garden, but the rest did. Well, the tomatoes didn't either, but that's only because the sixteen thousand tomatoes on the vine are still ripening, but for the rest of this month and a good chunk of September, we'll be eating about eight tomatoes a day apiece just to stay apace. Next year I'll probably add another hundred square feet to the garden. You know that American Gothic painting? I'm gonna be Farmer Joe with a pitchfork. And with that, it's time to stick my head into LOTRO for a bit. Fight the power, stick it to the man. 2 comments|post comment

OMG!! [05 Aug 2008|08:23pm] rifmeister Would definitely visit! 1 comment|post comment

[05 Aug 2008|08:24pm] thedan Just when you thought the EA nonsense was over: Greetings, The e-mail address you have written to is unable to receive incoming messages. Your question is important to us; please call us at 1 (650) 628-1001 for assistance with your request. Automated services and live agents are available by phone 24 hours per day. Thank you, Electronic Arts Customer Support This is a response I got today to an e-mail I sent six days ago. Thanks, guys! 2 comments|post comment

How often do you read LJ while logged out? [05 Aug 2008|07:38pm] ratatosk (I've been having trouble with this poll -- this is the third time I've tried. Hopefully it's okay now. Note that the wordings on the subject and the first question are reversed, because I am having a bad day in terms of not confusing people.) Note that this poll doesn't produce the cleanest of data: aside from response bias, you have to be logged in in order to take it. :P If you want to quibble with the questions, explain in comments, but you aren't getting a "Ticky box!" on this one. (Note: I posted and rapidly took down a badly-worded poll before settling on this one -- sorry if you managed to catch it!) Poll #1235861 Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All How often do you read LJ while logged in (as any user)? View Answers Always 34 (63.0%) Most of the time 18 (33.3%) Less than half the time 0 (0.0%) Rarely 1 (1.9%) Almost never: logged in just to take this poll 1 (1.9%) Considering only the times when you are logged in, how often do you read LiveJournal while logged in as someone else? View Answers More often than not 1 (1.9%) Sometimes, but regularly 2 (3.7%) Rarely 19 (35.2%) Never 32 (59.3%) The reason for asking is to find out if people I have friended ever miss friends-locked posts, and how often people who are not logged in can't view registered-user-only photos. Being logged in as someone else is something that can happen by accident when you borrow someone's computer -- I'm not implying that you are stalkerishly stealing passwords and so on. Feel free to comment anonymously on this post if you aren't logged in when you read it, especially if you don't have an LJ account but are reading this anyway. :) 21 comments|post comment

Firefly 2008: Part One [05 Aug 2008|04:47pm] laura47photos www.fireflyartscollective.org A fabulous annual festical in vermont. This year I went with ~20 friends and had an amazing time, then came down with pneumonia on the drive back. The bug, which is burned with great awesome on Saturday night. The fireworks display during the bug burning Hanging out and gettin' purty Eating at camp Me getting decorated with henna at camp. Obviously not taken by me. post comment

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