Penduin's Pen

There aren't enough positive news stories these days. It's all "tumbling economy" this and "damn politicians" that. Well today I feel good. And in true journalistic oversimplifying form, I'll tell you why in three bullet points.

• Messaging Architects: To quote another fat balding madman: "I love this companyyyy!"
• Bratwurst Friday: Everyone, from my coworkers to the folks up at Colosimo's Sausage to the fictional Hank Hill, has to crack a little smile at our little tradition.
• Beer: Rand brews a lot of really good stuff, and the double IPA I had today was no exception. I'd go so far as to say this is the bulleted list item that had the greatest effect on my happy mood right now, though the others are surprisingly close runners-up.

No real personal news today, and I haven't thought of any clever commentary, nor have I made any big breakthroughs with my pet projects, and I'm not angry enough at anything to write something funny and/or interesting. But with a belly full of bratwurst and beer, I feel the need to spread some good will and a message of relaxed "ahh"-ness. At this time slice in the great mass of pointless information, what's this one little message going to hurt anyhow?

Friends, family, countrymen: don't forget the little stuff. ...And never underestimate the positive psychological effects of good cheese.

(That's "Happy 2009", for anyone who doesn't speak Slackware-flavored smileys or hexidecimal.)

What better way to celebrate 2008 being over with than to prattle on about things that took place while it wasn't? ...Don't answer that. Surely there are countless better ways. But that's what I'm going to do anyway.

In 2008 my wrist got a little messed up, having grown a mysterious extra bit of bone or something. I posted a cool x-ray here (see April) and have files from the following inconclusive CAT scan, which I still mean to build a little interactive widget for sometime. I got a shot of cortisone, which helped. It's still not 100%, but it's not bad.

In 2008, I was sent to an artsy/geeky conference in Florence, so the missus and I got to hang out in Italy for a week. Still haven't finished the full online photo album, but we did post some stuff here (see April).

In 2008 my little sister got engaged, reminding me once again that I am very old. I can still call her "little", however, as she's all thin and whispy whereas I am ... not.

In 2008 Kim and I thwarted prescription pet food manufacturer Hills' attempt to murder our cat. They changed her only known compatible food, but we eventually did find one other. Go Eukanuba!

In 2008, Obama got numerous campaign contributions from both of us throughout his campaign. To everyone who thinks we forgot to send a Christmas gift: you're welcome!

In 2008 I won the "ownership" award at work for putting in some ridiculous hours and getting the job done no matter the task thrown at me. At least, that's what somebody thinks I do.

In 2008 the author of the IMAP protocol was hired at my workplace. He and I are building M+Guardian's new IMAP server together, which, I'll be honest, was a bit intimidating at first.

In 2008, I got sent on a business trip to Montreal just before Christmas, where Minego and I demonstrated why engineers shouldn't be allowed to participate in gift-stealing parties: our algorithms are superior to those of salespeople.

This is a rather pitiful way to keep in touch with everybody, but happy late holidays one and all! I hope 2009 treats you well.

:^) 0x7d9!

Labels: diary, iamold

Get out and vote! Go now! Yes, you!

Even the Shmoe knows you've got to vote today!

Boo! Yes, it's those little cute ghosts from the Super Mario games, lovingly crafted out of styrofoam by yours truly, with no small amount of help from the missus. For reasons unknown even to me, I was compelled to put these little guys together for Halloween decorations.

In low light they're not especially easy to photograph without lots of blur, but you get the idea. They hang out on our porch, spinning slowly or quickly depending on the wind, and generally look the other way when I try to line up a nice shot. :^)



The girl boo is probably my favorite. Kim thought we should give one a bow, which she put together beautifully. It's crazy how much personality is added with the slightest modifications. Say what you will of Nintendo's G-rated attitude, their character designs are super-fun.

As much as I hate flash, those pictures had a much higher success rate. It totally gives away the use of fishing line though. :^)

The big guy, the King Boo. My original idea was to make one big King Boo out of paper macche, so we were tooling around a craft store looking for all the supplies I'd need, when Kim found a soccer ball-sized styrofoam sphere, as well as some teardrop-shaped pieces. It was too small, I thought at first, but suddenly instead of one big messy process with a likely-rather-ugly result, I imagined a little swarm of boos, all hanging around their relatively big king. I think it turned out much better this way, and I've already had a blank-check offer from a work buddy to turn these into a mobile for his kid.

I thought I'd throw in some making-of shots, you can see the teardrop-shaped bits and some random shavings of previous pieces here.

They don't know it yet, but these things are arms and a tail of a cute little boo!

Our basement bathroom floor became more interesting as the paint on the boos' faces had to dry. The cat found this all fascinating too; we've had to keep the door shut for a couple weeks now.

The first foam boo and its maker, holding the bits together while the glue dried...

King Boo's crown, after being cut out of a foam cone but before being painted a nice shiny gold.

Progress! The boos, including the girl boo, are finally coming together.

Anyway I had a lot of fun putting together these little guys. Tonight is their big night, they're hanging out on our porch ready to greet (or, more true to form, turn away from) trick-or-treat'ers as we get pillaged for candy.

Happy Halloween, everybody!

Something odd struck me the other day. No great epiphany, just a few pieces of data falling near each other in my brain.

• domesticated cat meowing for food
• car honking
• baby crying
• television/radio/web advertising
• alarm clock
• telephone ring

These everyday things and plenty of others take advantage of a peculiar human behaviour: Annoy us and we'll capitulate. Whatever it is we don't really want to do, just make annoying noises to wear us down, and we'll give in.

Then there's the second layer of annoyance I get from realizing that. I'm annoyed, I'm feeding the cat, and I realize that I've just given in to this ridiculous behaviour, which further annoys me, but what am I going to do about it?

Of course sometimes this is a good thing. If somebody's stopped to send some text messages at a green light, they deserve to be annoyed by honking until they agree to look up at the road and drive. The trouble, of course, is that sound goes off in all directions. Now people in other lanes are also annoyed, whether they deserve it or not.

A crying baby probably needs something, and annoying noises are its only way of communication, so it's hard to get too upset at them. (This coming from a non-parent, your mileage may vary.) But by the time the kid's four years old, if it's throwing a hissyfit in the grocery store until the annoyed parent gives in and buys it whatever toy or candy it was whining about, then we've got a problem.

NOW IT'S COME TIME FOR ME TO TRY THIS OUT MYSELF. SINCE I DON'T HAVE ANY CLEVER ENDING IN MIND FOR THIS POST, I'M GOING TO WRITE IN ANNOYING ALL-CAPS UNTIL YOU STOP READING. THE QUICKEST ESCAPE ROUTE IS TO CLICK THE LINK BELOW, A TOTALLY UNRELATED PAGE SET UP BY MY SOON-TO-BE BROTHER-IN-LAW. CLICK THAT AND STOP READING NOW. WHY HAVEN'T YOU GONE TO HIS PAGE YET? GLUTTON FOR PUNISHMENT EH? WELL, WHILE I'M STILL ANNOYING YOU, I RECOMMEND THAT YOU ALSO POST A LINK TO THIS PAGE. POST IT ANYWHERE, HE'S NOT FUSSY. POST IT WITH THE LINK TEXT AS "ABALASTOW COMPENDIUM" FOR MAXIMUM IMPACT. BUT NOT IN ALL CAPS. OK REALLY I DON'T HAVE ANY MORE TO SAY. JUST CLICK THE LINK AND ALL THIS ANNOYING TEXT WILL GO AWAY. DO IT! DO IT NOW!

Link: abalastow compendium (www.abalastow-compendium.org)

Another short, pathetic excuse for a post. If you pry a fidgety geek like myself away from his keyboard long enough for a meeting and a second-hand smoke break or two, while he's armed with a dead floppy disk and a swiss army knife, then he might remember seeing this years ago, and subsequently wind up with this:

Incidentally, flip one of these upside-down and it passes for a podracer. Beat that for geekiness!

Somebody on this side of the building has waffles.

It's maddening.

Labels: diary