Friday, October 29, 2010

Happy Hal`10ween!

It's that time of year again! That time of year we buy up bags of candy "for trick or treaters" put out our cool little flag, and take knives and fire (and, this year, foil) to shapely orange vegetables.

They make a cute couple, don't you think?
After my squarish pumpkin had its face, Kim noticed it looked a bit like Frankenstein's monster. Some extra slices and aluminum foil experiments later, he had neck bolts and some stylish head stitches. Go ahead and zoom in if you like, but don't look too close - I just noticed the bolts are threaded backwards!

Kim's nearly spherical pumpkin got a happy ghost face, and doesn't even seem to mind being checked out by Frankie. It's really enjoying itself; it knows it's a special time of year.

Both of these characters gave us a good supply of seeds too (Happy Ghost's are especially plump); here's hoping we can cook them up as good as last year's.

Thursday, October 21, 2010

eStuff, iThings...

In the '90s, it was eStuff. eBooks, eMachines, eBay, "E" was the little letter to stick on your brand. Then, it was on to the next vowel.

In the '00s, it was iThings. iPods, iMacs, iPhones... Heck, the world's best-selling video game console is nothing more than a "W" with two little "i"s tacked on.

I've got the next one. Vowels are on the way out. I mean, who wants to be seen in public with an oFace or look up their contacts on a uWho? Obviously, the next big trend in naming is ...

π (yes, "pi".)

I've already begun work on the πPod, which obviously will be used to play MP3.14159 files. (You may have already read about that compression algorithm.)

Tuesday, October 12, 2010

You've been told WHAT?!

Got something interesting (for certain, grotesque values of "interesting") in the snail mail:


If you don't feel like zooming in, the letter begins:
If you're the Republican I've been told you are, then I need you to...
Now I don't know who's been spreading such rumors, and I've been called a lot of things in my life, but never "Republican". That's just low.

A short while ago, my wife got the same insulting letter, and she figured out the proper response (once she quit cursing). Since this was a solicitation for campaign money, obviously the correct thing to do was was to turn around and give money to the Democrats. And so she did. These folks didn't learn their lesson, they sent me the letter, so now I did too.

We suspect our names were collected from the DMV or something. Just because we live in Utah doesn't mean we're Republican. Or Mormon. Oh, and I only have the one wife. I'm white, that's about all you get.

I suppose it could have been worse. The Teabaggers could have written asking me for money. But apparently the rumors about me haven't gotten so bad that anybody's accused me of being an ignorant-as-hell-and-proud-of-it, racist, homophobic, corporate-puppet, doomsday-cult zombie.

Not sure who to donate to if that letter comes.

Monday, October 11, 2010

Vacuum

Two quick ideas for vacuum cleaners.
<accent type="british">Ones that work properly.</accent>

Cordless Upright Vacuum
This one, I could build. I'm tempted to. Get me an off-the-shelf energy-star vacuum cleaner, a home office uninterruptible power supply, some warranty-voiding tools, a few yards of duct tape, and an afternoon, and I'll give you a vacuum that doesn't try to trip you dozens of times with its big stupid clumsy power cord while you use it. Actually I won't give it to you, I'll keep it. Even if it kind of sucks.
(...Did a quick Google search... no, not a little pretend vacuum, not a dustbuster, a real friggin' cordless vacuum. I don't care if it's heavy. I'm as strong as I am clumsy. Lose the wire.)

Spot RoomBot
We don't have a roomba, but the idea is appealing. We do, however, have a spotbot, and it is worth its weight in gold because it cleans up after our runt of a cat, who can't eat anything other than one kind of prescription food, but does anyway. A spotbot which could seek out the next area of barfplops and tailsmears would be worth its weight in ... something else super-valuable.
...This one's quite a bit harder. It would need to be able to refuel itself with water and detergent (and dump out the cat-barf-tainted water) as well as deal with taller solid masses in addition to spill-type floor-level stains. Sign me up for version 2.0 of this one; working out the kinks in this design would be more gross than my current techniques.

Friday, October 08, 2010

Happy Anniversary to Us

Five years ago, this happened:


...It actually happened in color, but you get the idea. A Minnesota girl and a Wisconsin boy got married. They're not usually ones to get all dressed up (he also doesn't normally shave) but they'd fallen in love and grown to mean the world to each other. Five years ago today, they became husband and wife.

Thank you, Kim, for the last five years, for the time we were together before that, and for all the time we'll have from here on out. You're amazing, and you make me feel like I can be amazing too.

Happy anniversary to us!