Rant

Sat'day

An eventful year comes to an uneventful end. I wonder what tomorrow will bring...

What will they think up next?

Apparently the people at Columbia University have been busy with something new... Wow.

Tomorrow

Even the heavens will be having a special event leading up to the moment of my birth...

Doens't it make you feel all warm and tingly? OK. Me neither.

Humid and Sticky

...but it's Friday. So why complain? Why not?

DNC was last night, and I watched a good deal of it. Very surprised that the FCC hasn't come down on anyone for broadcasting profanities... over some balloons no less.

The Bourne Sold-out-acy

I figured The Bourne Supremacy wouldn't have been such a big draw at the local theater -- I figured wrong. Of course, no mention of the movie being sold-out until I got to the window and asked for a ticket. Typical. That's what I get for leaving the house. :-)

Went and bought a few groceries instead. Got Milk? I do. One week and one hour away from the most special day of the year...

Riiiiiight.

Got guns?

Big Yawn.

Almost time for bed. Early Saturday morning, and I've been bouncing around since 6am. I've had enough. Got a lot done, so much more to do.

Cleaning the apartment is on my list, the problem is that I think I have to unplug the computer to do so - since I keep finding my ass in this chair wasting time.

I did make some progress while sitting here... just not what my agenda was aimed at. I also found some pictures I took of the World Trade Center that I didn't know I had, hidden in a sub-directory of a sub-directory in my images mess. I put them up with the rest of my shared stuff. Still awkward to see how large and looming the buildings were -- and to look now and see them gone. Like a body with a missing limb.

Off to toss and turn until I give up and pass out...

Wireless Boosted

I have a wireless network set up for network cameras and moving around with a laptop in my apartment free of a CAT-5 leash. It's running on a Linksys WAP11 Access Point (which is running D-Link 900AP firmware, of all things) in conjunction with a Linksys Signal Booster. I had a second booster sitting around that I was going to use with an additional access point, when a magical idea hit me: I wondered... could you hook up the second booster to the first and get double the boost? Why yes! Yes you can!

In the first picture, you can see the triple-stacked booster-licious wall mount. In the second picture, we start with the regular boosted signal... it drops down when I take everything apart to reconnect, then jumps to new heights as both boosters are up and running. Something in the neighborhood of a +20db gain - which makes all the difference in the world.

A weird side effect I've noticed since hooking this all up, is that I can cook food just by putting it in close proximity to the double-boosted access point for about 5 minutes... (Har har har. No need to tell me how funny I am; I am reminded every morning when I look in the mirror).

Today's Word: Paronychia

Not for the particularly squeamish...

I trimmed some cuticle from my thumbnail area a few days ago, as it was hanging off the side. I didn't think much of it at the time...

That was until it started becoming red and slightly swollen. It turns out that cutting-away of the cuticle gave just enough room for bacteria to create a minor infection site. This whole ordeal is called, "Paronychia". It's caused by Staphylococcus (e.g. "Staph") or Streptococcus (e.g. "Strep") bacteria entering through a small wound or opening and setting-up shop.

Now my thumb is pretty sore, and I think I am at the apex of this shindig. It's been relatively mild, and I'm not worried about dying or anything... but I now have to soak several times a day in a water/anti-bacterial soap solution until this crap goes away. Fun. There was a little pus (IEW IEW IEW!), but that segment of the Paronychial Prestige seems to be over with.

As an aside: We live in good times indeed, when anyone with an Internet connection can go out and call upon "Dr. Thewebi N. Ternet" to identify common maladies and their identification and/or treatments. This can of course lead to a great amount of hypochondria -- but I think the benefits are invaluable.

Dry run.

Well, now I know where the Weehawken Municipal Building is located, and that it's hell to get around the Lincoln Tunnel during morning rush hour to get there. I did go, only to find a large sign that said, "No Tank Tops, No Shorts." Well, I wasn't wearing a tank top...

So I wasn't allowed in, but they marked my appearance and will be rescheduling me. That is extra nice, because who wouldn't want to do this twice? I feel very dumb and hope I don't do anything else today to continue the feeling. I will not be wearing shorts next time (although looking through the windows into the courtroom made the sign seemed a little ridiculous - apparently skirts of all varieties and jeans and t-shirts were acceptable, but my twill shorts and collared shirt were not).

Better luck next time. Wash, Rinse, Repeat.

Funday

Everybody has their day in court, and today I have mine (I got a ticket a short while back in a neighboring town). Hopefully, the prosecutor will meet me half-way with some sort of amendment to the charge ("Fail to stop steady red"). I was behind a bus and didn't see the light... AND it was during rush-hour, so my mind was more focused on other cars -- not hitting/getting hit/etc. Excuses, excuses, excuses...

*Yawn*

Time for my breakfast feeding.

In other news...

Today perfected a nice random image displayer in PHP, and I made a logo-type-header image for my friend Tom's site. I am trying to recover from my SPAM tasting mistake. I think I need some sort of spicy food to eradicate the flavor from my mouth... or maybe I should guzzle bleach.

Oh - back to the logo-thing. It is a happy little flash file, so I will stick it here for my (and the 3 people that read this) enjoyment. It might look a little crappy since I had to reduce the size. Too bad for you.

The bouncing red dot is very uplifting, no? Well, okay. You can't say I didn't try. Maybe a big version, with a different ending would do it for you...

SPAM, the food kind

If you can call it food. When my dear downstairs neighbors moved to Texas at the end of June, they cleaned out their cabinets and had some leftover food products. They brought them up to me.

In this varied collection there was a can of SPAM. I don't ever remember eating SPAM, so I figured what the hell? How bad could it be? Let me tell you -- it was pretty damn bad.

First, opening the can sprayed me with SPAM-juice/gel. Nasty with a capital "N". Secondly, the aroma was something I still can not place (other than it had a similarity to bolgna that had been left on the dashboard of a car in the hot sun -- for about a week). I assumed if I cooked it on the stove a little, it would improve... so I proceded to do so.

I sliced it up, then sauteed is in a pan. The smell was getting worse. People EAT this stuff? For real?

After I could take no more SPAM-steam, I pulled the dripping pieces out and put all of them on paper towels and tried to squeeze the nastiness out. No luck. Time to break out the Duck Sauce. That can cover up anything, right?

Wrong.

Bottom line - all but one single bite went in the garbage. I regret even that much is floating somewhere in my stomach. Smells badly, tastes worse. The company says its products are, "Crazy Tasty^TM." They're the ones who are f*cking crazy. "Tasty" is the last word to come to mind.

Blech.

TUNAK TUNAK TUN!

I have no idea what that means, but it is ringing in my head. From time to time I stumble across interesting people, things, movies, products, etc (just like everyone does) when I surf the web. Tonight was no exception.

Today's discovery is Daler Mehndi. "He is the Badshah of indipop" (????). I was buying a lottery ticket at the Pakastani electronics/cell phone/phone card/music/video/gas-powered-mini-bike store when I spied an interesting looking CD case. I snapped a pic with my phone, posted it to my site, and didn't think about it again.

When I went and looked at the pic later, I decided I needed to know more about this Daler Mehndi (okay - I was just bored). I googled him, and will never be the same again. I can't decide whether he makes me feel better about my life or worse...

The Video
The Church of Daler
Inspiration for a cult?
Is he running from the law?

Fahrenhype 9/11

Just finished watching Michael Moore's "Fahrenheit 9/11". While I am no fan of Moore, I certainly don't hate him as much as I thought I did. I had an awful opinion of him in general (I assume seeded by his overall perception) going into seeing the film, and now I would guess I am in the neighborhood of apathy -- which is a marked improvement. The movie is not as controversial, bad, slanted, etc as reports might have the world believe.

It raises a number of questions and overall offers a different perspective on events just previous to and following 9/11/2001. Is it biased? You bet. Is that bias an overpowering brain-washing media spin? No, not really. Is it accurate? I suspect it is as accurate as general "60 Minutes" or "20/20" reporting. Everybody spins, and everyone has a bias. I'm glad I watched it.

While I can't say I 'enjoyed' the film (only because of the nature of the subject matter - how can you enjoy something so serious and so grave?), I will recommend viewing it (especially due to matters discussed in my previous post - that you can effectively view the film for free). If nothing else, it showed me a little more than I had seen and broadened my view.

Your mileage may vary.

Lazy Comfortable Day

I'm never comfortable however, so I'm trying to keep moving. Dinner is on (Chicken Ala Tim, new potatoes, iced tea, etc.), and I'm downloading Fahrenheit 9/11 via BitTorrent.

Don't worry - Michael Moore said it was ok with him.

I don't really care for Moore's method of incomplete truth and spin - although I do acknowledge that is what EVERYONE in the media does. So I will download and view his film so I can see what all the hub-bub is about, and I won't have to give Mikey $10. Sorry Mr. Moore -- it will mean one less box of Ring-Dings (but hey -- you might lose a pound or two).

WIN/WIN

Independence Day

*yawn* Hope no one I know does anything stupid with fireworks today... It's a little too early. Back to bad.

2 new sets of neighbors...

The apartments above and below me (it's a brownstone, btw) have new occupants. Briefly *almost* met the two upstairs neighbors (who are named like some Liverpudlian rock & roll band members from yester-year), and spent a few moments getting to know the two downstairs newbies.

I'm sure I'll get along fine with the upstairs bunch... the ones below: they look like trouble to me. ;-P They have already been very friendly, which can only be a bad sign of things to come. Yes, I'm kidding... I have no doubts all will mesh swimmingly well. I'll miss my old neighbors. It can be so difficult to train new ones. Oh well... :-)

In other news, the mulberry tree in front of my building is just about done spewing its riches groundward. I look forward to cleaner floors and sidewalk in the weeks to come.

Took an online quiz today. It was almost fun, so I will share...

Mark your calendars: One month left until my birthday... another year gone by.

Gift Idea #54: Since I'm old, a walker or Mobility Scooter...

365 days

It has been one year since I quit smoking. I no longer smoke, and have lost at least 47lbs (I weighed 197lbs June 30th, 2003 - this morning I clocked in at 150lbs). Go me. What was the key? Celery. Lots of celery. Took care of all of my oral fixations that come from smoking and wanting to eat. Also made me as regular as a German clock...

I'm never going to smoke again, and I really hope I don't gain any weight back (especially since I've already gotten rid of all of my old clothing). If I can't be good-looking or smart, at least I can be thin. :-)