Flutterby™! From 1999-10-01 to 1999-10-30

The Case for Stupid Software. Software which tries to protect users from the internal processes is:

"...like dealing with a injured animal. It can't tell you where it hurts, so you have to guess why it's not eating, why it's curled up in the corner pulling its fur out."

[ related topics: Web development ]

The image binge continues, this time looking south to Mount Tamalpais from the hills above San Anselmo and Ross, in Marin County.

[ related topics: Photography San Anselmo ]

Back from Burning Man. Ian, you totally rock, thanks for the extensive help in turning the quadricycle from a novelty that might have lasted a day or two to a workhorse vehicle of our camp. It was a big hit. Two pictures that Ian took: [Quadricycle picture 1 (304k)] | [Quadricycle picture 2 (309k)] Longer report in a bit.

[ related topics: Burning Man ]

I missed my chance to be in the Spencer Tunick photo shoot at Burning Man, but Spencer has a photo in Nerve that's probably indicative.

[ related topics: Burning Man Erotic ]

In the new Comes Naturally David Steinberg talks about Saving the Pseudo-Children from Virtual Abuse.

[ related topics: Children and growing up Web development Sexual Culture ]

Brad points to this great article about acceptance in Rehobeth Beach, about how a conservative "family values" oriented town is coming to grips with being a vacation spot that people of all preferences love.

The anti-gay "family town" bumper sticker his car once sported is long gone. The woman he has since married once worked at the restaurant that opened Rehoboth's first openly gay bar and is, as he puts it, "Miss Tolerance." Now, he says with a self-amused smile, "I would put a bumper sticker on my car, if they made one, that said, 'Keep Rehoboth a Diverse Town.' "

[ related topics: Interactive Drama Web development Sexual Culture ]

Wes points to DTCP information, a scheme to copyright protect protect digital content. Alas, everything seems to be stored in PDF. Hello? Anyone out there remember that it's HTextTP? Or that PDF files do notoriously badly as search targets? I'll dig later to see what I really think of it.

Okay, I threw up that Chicago Tribune article about weblogs because it mentioned Flutterby, but I went back and read it, and it's worth a read on its own sake, not just for my ego. Meta: John S. Rhodes pointed out a Flutterby mention in the Chicago Tribune.

[ related topics: Web development Weblogs Flutterby Meta ]

Knowing that I'd missed a Susie Bright Salon article, I searched for it yesterday and missed it. Well, Jorn found it. So here's Susie's guide to old style adult bookstores. Interestingly, this subject just came up on the SHS mailing list, and I remembered how lucky I am to have Good Vibrations nearby, with a helpful approachable staff, and an atmosphere that's friendly and inviting and not "cruisy" in the least.

[ related topics: Jorn Barger Good Vibrations Web development Erotic Sexual Culture ]

QOTD:

Ye gods! So the US allows people to carry guns but rigorously prevents them from having marijuana? Isn't that kinda like saying "let's give the populace easy access to weaponry and try our damnest to stop them being relaxed and laid back about things". Or, to put it slightly more simply, "let's make the populace well armed and irritible".

--- Robert Blake in the Scary Devil Monastery

[ related topics: Drugs Quotes ]

In Salon Magazine, a survivor of the Branch Davidians speaks out, quite a compelling read.

[ related topics: Web development ]

Via Robot Wisdom comes this Gamasutra article about coding network gaming. It suffers because the author isn't terribly knowledgeable about networking issues and terminology, but it is a good reminder that simply opening up a socket stream and sending data is not an acceptable solution to real time issues. Especially under Windows where the socket layer sucks solar systems through surgical tubing.

[ related topics: Jorn Barger Games Microsoft ]

So apparently Steve Jobs has accepted a spot on the board of The Gap. Does this mean we're gonna get jeans in 5 delicious shiny see through flavors? Or just back to khaki Macs?

Scary Devil Monastery QOTD:

People who are willing to rely on the government to keep them safe are pretty much standing on Darwin's mat, pounding on the door, screaming, "Take me, take me!"

-- Carl Jacobs

[ related topics: Quotes ]

Via FactoVision, an article about green manufacturing taking more resources than just using petroleum.

"By focusing on the origin of the raw materials we have lost track of the energy it takes to move materials through a process."

Bovine Inversus has just earned a place on my nibelung list, partially by linking to a page on the early origins of common fairy tales. One of my recent interests has been how myths evolve to support the cultural mores that pass them along, the weakening of Little Red Riding Hood is a perfect example of that.

[ related topics: Web development ]

A cow-orker passes along a note about David Schriner's remote computer killer, it claims a range of about 20 feet. I'll leave potential applications up to y'all...

"The HERF gun is not particularly high-tech, either. The device uses technology dating back to Tesla, essentially pushing a 20 megawatt burst of undisciplined radio noise through an antenna."

[ related topics: Web development ]

Well, the original Bastard Operator From Hell BOFH and quite a few of the newer episodes do indeed survive, although there are probably some legal issues with the newer episodes in this archive... One of the problems I have with using the web as a research resource is that information is so transient. Due to assorted mergers and acquisitions, the new BOFH chronicles have died and the archive has disappeared.

[ related topics: Web development ]

Article in Salon about hair braiding licensing requirements in California. A good argument against short-sighted protectionist licensing systems, as most usually are. Keep the state out of certifications where ever possible.

[ related topics: Web development ]

Okay, I'm getting boring with constantly falling back on the Scary Devil Monastery for quotes, but...

"How do the telcos get the brains out of their employees without leaving visible marks?"

--- Mike Andrews in the Scary Devil Monastery

[ related topics: Quotes ]

Just because Todd keeps pestering me to put more graphics on these pages, from my latest set of PhotoCD scans, and in keeping with the Flutterby theme, a Monarch Butterfly in a field near Crater Lake, in Oregon, last fall.

[ related topics: Butterflies Photography ]

Everybody else is linking to it, and it's a good article, so I'll pass on this revelation that us nerds are probably slightly autistic. I've long suspected that there are things about how my mind works that don't apply to "normal" people. It also looks like this book Shadow Syndromes might be worth a look-see.

[ related topics: Web development Books ]

I'm a temporarily recovering programmer: After 4 years I've decided it's time that I leave Pixar to pursue other interests. I'll be working a few more weeks here, getting the NT port of RenderMan out and the build process for it stable, working on a few network rendering issues, then it's time to go do other things. I'll be joining Todd at Coyote Grits for various conslutting projects while we try to figure out what neat products the world wants. Personally I'm pushing for a real content management system to eradicate all those out-of-date web pages, but while the world needs that, I'm not sure that they want it.

[ related topics: Pixar Content Management Animation Microsoft ]

An idea for a Burning Man theme camp next year: Camp Cuddle.

[ related topics: Burning Man ]

In keeping with the image of the day theme (that isn't quite as popular as writing about sex), here's a sunrise over the Golden Gate bridge that I captured last December. I know, cheesey gratuitous glamour shot with no artistic value, but it is pretty.

[ related topics: Photography Erotic Sexual Culture ]

The iBrator. Feel different.

[ related topics: Web development ]

Via Scripting News a quick article on using RSS news feeds in Perl. Flutterby's RSS version is available at http://www.flutterby.com/main.rdf

[ related topics: Content Management Dave Winer ]

Nerdly note: One of my cow-orkers has been doing some benchmarking, and on most Un*x platforms interprocess pipe communication is optimized out the yinyang, so there's essentially no reason not to structure systems as layers of separate process talking through pipes. This is emphatically not the case under Windows, but that's not a viable scalable enterprise platform anyway, so why would you care?

[ related topics: Microsoft ]

Whitewater enthusiasts: I've added new pictures to my renowned (but ancient) Ocoee tour. Note especially the 7 picture sequence at Cat's Pyjamas that I should really turn into an animated GIF. Thanks to Rick for driving and tagging along when I was in 'nooga and had a chance to take these!

[ related topics: Web development Animation ]

Back to the butterfly theme with today's picture, albeit abstractly. A clump of clover in Muir Woods.

[ related topics: Butterflies Photography ]

Salon has an article on The art of Don E. Knuth that's kind of fluffish, but is worth reading for the Ellen Ullman quote:

"It would be very difficult these days to take a job and approach programming in that sort of algorithm and design sense, [but] it's a solace to think that there are places where people think deeply about algorithms in a general and abstract way and have notions of elegance and beauty."

[ related topics: Web development ]

Can't get no sympathy: I hate clothes shopping, but I've lost weight recently, and I'm starting to feel like a skateboarder. I don't know if it was just Burning Man or a general trend, but it'd be real cool to stabilize back at a 32" waist.

[ related topics: Burning Man Interactive Drama ]

QOTD:

So I wish you first a sense of theatre;

only Those who love illusion and know it will go far:

Otherwise we spend our lives in a confusion;

Of what we say and do with Who we really are.

--- Many Happy Returns, W.H. Auden, quoted by Dreamer

[ related topics: Quotes ]

Once again, the Scary Devil Monastery speaks truths:

"The amount of gameplay is inverse to the total surface area of pre-rendered marble in the game."

--- Zembar, attributing to someone else unknown.

[ related topics: Games ]

Whoopsie! The latest Risks digest (might not be up yet, I'm reading the news feed) has a report of an ex-car bomber who apparently miscommunicated with his crew over the hour time difference between Israel and Palestine (on daylight savings time).

[ related topics: Web development ]

Self aggrandizing QOTD:

Some people march to the beat of a different drummer...

Dan seeks to build the drums.</blockqutoe>

--- Mike Harrison

[ related topics: Quotes ]

Susie Bright talks about getting laid on the road. I'll be at Cody's in Berkeley on Tuesday at 7:30 for her new book talk.

[ related topics: Web development Books Erotic Sexual Culture ]

Nerve has a review of that allegedly boundary pushing sexy new art-house film Romance:

The graphic scenes include a couple of unconvincing blow jobs, some tentative stroking of Paolo's condom-shrouded penis, one come shot (part of a Madonna/whore allegorical dream sequence), close-ups of Marie's pubes, one damp digit, an overpopulated gynecological exam and a full-on stretched-to-the-max birthing scene. These scenes might push the scandal envelope of the art-house circuit, but erotic they are not. There is little human about the sexuality portrayed, even less dignity

[ related topics: Erotic ]

Via Hack the Planet, an interview with Roger Schank on how universities have lost sight of their function, with some hope that perhaps for everything we're losing by going to "the virtual university", we're gaining because this is a chance to shift points of view:

To put this another way, everyone involved in the drama of indifferent education, faculty, students, and administrators, knows that the real role of our universities is certification not education.

[ related topics: Web development ]

Catherine's update of Mike's "Dan seeks to build the drums" statement was "Dan seeks to play the drums". Hmmmmm...

[ related topics: Dan's Life ]

Jesux: The Linux distribution that will not lead you into temptation. No news as to how they're going to handle the casting out of daemons.

[ related topics: Free Software ]

Pretty pictures at the Chandra X-ray Observatory Center.

Apropos of nothing at all: I bought an oxy-acetylene torch yesterday. The urge to create more quadricycle like vehicles and other kinetic sculpture was large enough that when the opportunity presented itself, I jumped. It'd be really cool to field an entry to the World Championship Great Arcata to Ferndale Cross Country Kinetic Sculpture Race, but that requires some design elements I'm not sure I'm ready to include in my next vehicle. (As an side, I'm sure I've posted a link to that before, but can't find it. So I need to get my local search engine up and running. Perhaps if I can keep prospective job offers and amorous women to a minimum this weekend I'll be able to get some coding time in.)

[ related topics: Interactive Drama Web development ]

Many of us lusted after Y.T.'s impact suit in Snow Crash. It looks like there's a prototype of a serious protective body armor is here.

[ related topics: Web development ]

Okay, everyone else has linked to this, and I'd been ignoring it, but I was going through Arts & Letters Daily and ran across it, and it reminded me of why I despise Utne Reader. The article is about the difficulties of building an environmentally sensitive house, and I was sympathetic as I read through the attempts and difficulties in building a house that used as few old-growth products as possible and was efficient, 'til I ran across the sentence that completely destroyed any sympathy towards the authors I may have had (emphasis mine): "My husband and I and our four children did not expect to live in a simple cabin, as Thoreau did."

[ related topics: Children and growing up ]

Keith Knight on inappropriate language.

[ related topics: Humor Web development ]

Rafe Colburn points to the New York Times summary of the Microsoft trial closing arguments. As much as I despise the mistruths and deception that are Microsoft's business practices, I know that there'll be no justice done here.

[ related topics: Language Web development Books Microsoft ]

Counting down to 6 billion, estimated to be October 12^th.

QOTD, on the "sex is 90% mental" subject:

"You can rub my head until I turn 180 years old and I'm not going to have an orgasm."

--- Betty Dodson quoted in Andrea Nemerson's alt.sex column

[ related topics: Quotes Web development Erotic Sexual Culture ]

Tourist snapshot: Point Bonita Lighthouse, on the north side of the Golden Gate where the San Francisco Bay meets the Pacific. This is a good exercise, it's interesting to see how my photography has changed, what I consider a good shot now versus when I had my first PhotoCD scan made, and how I approach photography differently. Obviously the way to make these landscapes more interesting is more nudes!.

[ related topics: Photography Erotic ]

Okay, maybe you've got to be a Sluggy fan, been following the current story line, and have a little bit of both Bun-Bun (the psychotic switchblade-weilding cuddly bunny) and Torg (the clueless web designer) in you to appreciate the punch line of yesterday's Sluggy episode, but it set me off for some reason.

[ related topics: Humor Web development ]

Ages ago Eric proposed that the right way to build software projects was to keep a consistent technical team and contract hire the management teams. It occurs to me that this is what venture capitalists are doing. Nice prescience, Eric.

Jorn pointed to the Patterns-Discussion FAQ, the reading of which brought up thoughts of how the links and comments about dramatic structure that Peter Merholz made yesterday tie into patterns.

[ related topics: Jorn Barger Web development ]

Scary Devil Monastery QOTD:

I used to herd dairy cows. Now I herd lusers. Apart from the isolation, I think I preferred the cows. They were better conversation, easier to milk, and if they annoyed me enough, I could shoot them and eat them.

--- Rodger Donaldson

[ related topics: Quotes Interactive Drama ]

"MS Linux is released under the provisions of the Gates Private License, which means you can freely use this Software on a single machine without warranty after having paid the purchase price and annual renewal fees."

[ related topics: Free Software ]

A CNN article about Princeton bioethics professor Peter Singer questioning the wrongness of infanticide. I believe Singer is the same guy who's made some pretty interesting discussions about human mental development versus the intellectual levels other species and how that relates to those who choose to be omnivorous. Undoubtedly this is extremely one-sided knee jerk journalism, which would explain the various responses to it.

[ related topics: Ethics Peter Singer ]

A pyro and her flames. Dan attempts to up his coolness factor by pointing out that he sometimes hangs out with cool people, in this case Kiki watching the earliest prototype of her Firefall, the third version of which ended up being a huge bowl fountain at Burning Man.

[ related topics: Burning Man Photography ]

Well, Screaming Lord Sutch may be dead, but Britain's Monster Raving Loony Party lives on. Howling Laud Hope is running against his cat Mandu. "Vote insanity, you know it makes sense."

Whitewater rafting helps Croatia rebuild.

[ related topics: Web development ]

john s jacobs anderson of Genehack points out a couple of omissions in yesterday's notes on separating reality and fantasy: the TV actor who gets approached with tips on how to handle situations that their character is in (He mentions a Harlan Ellison report on one of the Ponderosa characters); the "exploding car crash" meme causing people recently pulled from accidents to behave irrationally (no mention of the requisite flaming tire rolling from the wreckage, however[*]); and the assorted RISKS reports of "simpler" user interfaces obscuring the true meanings of what the user is manipulating. Objectivism appeals to me, but it's predicated on the belief that humans are rational beings. I can buy that in my more optimistic moments, but sometimes I wonder if in being up-beat I'm just masking the reality. Sigh. Oh well, go run Windows, rent your summer special effects movies from Blockbuster, and buy your coffee at Starbucks. Just expect no pity from me.

[*]Gratuitous Terry Pratchett reference.

[ related topics: Objectivism John S Jacobs-Anderson Technology and Culture Microsoft Terry Pratchett ]

QOTD:

When all you've got is a nailgun, every problem looks like a messiah...

--- Iain Chalmers

[ related topics: Quotes ]

Apparently I missed the cool Nova program that detailed this, but the A/S Norske Shell E&P Troll pages have some pictures of an oil platform similar to the one that crashed hard. Yow, that's one big piece o' hardware. More notes on the failure of the Sleipner A platform, "A later survey of the bottom of the 220m deep fjord revealed that no debris larger than 10m remained." You've gotta love any engineering failure which causes "a seismic event registering 3.0 on the Richter scale", such as the sinking of the Sleipner A offshore platform.

[ related topics: Web development ]

Via Columbine comes this hilarious diary entry on the effects of rain on Californians.

If you're hard up for an image of the day, you could satisfy yourself with this image of a kayaker shredding a wave on the Ocoee, or fulfill your jones completely by looking at the sequence of pictures on the bottom of my Hell's Hole description which illustrate what happens when a gulli... err... adventurous... crew member falls for the old "riding the bull" routine. Great fun.

[ related topics: Interactive Drama Web development Photography ]

In my anti-consumerism vein, Salon looks at techniques used to persuade, how slumps in sales aren't a failure of product, but of advertising and image.

Where Shell had gone wrong, it seems, was in reasoning that, since people don't start buying gas until at least age 16, there was no need to target the tiniest consumers. "They weren't even on Shell's radar," Oeschle laments. To remedy that oversight, the company is now moving forward with a "multifaceted campaign" aimed at conditioning youngsters to be loyal enthusiasts of Shell products.

[ related topics: Web development ]

Hadn't thought about this: "Stonewall" means both to provide an impenetrably front, and the event marking a radical change in opinion.

Salon has part 2 of that article on advertising. Quoting Virginia Valentine: "consumers are constructed by the communications of [popular] culture ... They are not prime causes. They are cultural effects."

[ related topics: Web development ]

Thanks to Ian, Nathaniel Branden's Judgement Day is on my "to read" list, and via Arts & Letter's Daily comes a Lingua Franca article on Ayn Rand's inroads into academia which includes a long history of Objectivism as a movement, including some analysis of the current trend to incorporate portions into academia, and some notes which seemed apropos to my current musings:

"Unfortunately, people who try to evade reality in these ways do not just die off from sheer stupidity. Through force and fraud, they devour the products of those who create and manufacture."

[ related topics: Politics Objectivism Web development ]

David Steinberg's Comes Naturally #88 talks about his encounter with the Bhagwan shree Rajneesh.

[ related topics: Web development Sexual Culture ]

While I'm being paranoid, is Buford Furrow an anti-semite or a government lackey. He's the guy who allegedly shot up the Granada Hills Jewish Center in LA, a columnist for the Bay Guardian claims there's some inconsistencies in the story. Never explain by conspiracy what can be adequately described by stupidity, but what happens when both answers end up at the same place? Ray Bradbury's vision in Fahrenheit 451 of people arrested because the media needed to show an arrest has come true, that poor security guard in the Centennial park bombing in Atlanta comes immediately to mind.

[ related topics: Religion Web development ]

Rafe Colburn pointed out that the CIA is starting a venture capital operation, which makes me wonder about some accountability issues.

[ related topics: Web development ]

Part 3 of Ruth Shalit's piece on advertising. Jesse says that there's some controversy over Shalit's credibility, I'll investigate further, but the thrust of the articles is consistent with my experiences and discussions.

[ related topics: Web development ]

Keith Knight tackles pinball.

[ related topics: Humor Web development ]

There's a discussion on Ruth Shalit on Salon's Tabletalk forum. Interesting bunch of sour grapes, especially the "ads don't work on me, although I do drink Coke and buy at the Gap".

Xenophobia at its ugliest: Someone this morning passed around http://www.nonationalid.com/ This was soon followed by Lamar Smith's rebuttal, which contains this charming piece of fear mongering:

"We need look no further than the case of the serial killer, Raphael Resendez-Ramirez, for a stark example of why we need to take measures to control the documents used by illegal aliens. According to the FBI, Ramirez has used at least four different social security numbers to facilitate his use of numerous aliases." (underscores in the original)

Drama. Agony. Texans. Trucks. It's Hands on a Hardbody:

Then there's the mental side, which is like your own private freak show. The third dimension gets very arbitrary -- a row of trucks stretches for miles, your legs seem to be 3 inches long. The year J.D. Drew won, he spent six hours entertaining a delusion that a jumbo jet had landed across the street from the dealership and people were, in the commercial airline parlance, deplaning.

[ related topics: Web development ]

D'oh! It wasn't Jesse at all who pointed me to the assertions about Shalit, it was Kendall. Although after that unwarranted credit Jesse did pull up two articles about Shalit's plagiarism: http://www.salon1999.com/weekly/plagiarism960722.html http://www.tnellen.com/cybereng/ethics/purloined.htm

[ related topics: Web development ]

Dysfunctional Family Circus: RIP.

[ related topics: Humor ]

The Dysfunctional Family Circus ending its run, and the text on the site is a good read.

[ related topics: Humor ]

Via Scripting News, Amazon shows that nothing is quaint anymore. Everything is a commodity made in China. So why won't anyone who wants to buy stuff from Amazon pay their $9.95 a month and treat it like CostCo? Or is that, perhaps, the hope?

[ related topics: Books Dave Winer ]

To go with my Objectivism notes earlier in the week, Peikoff's last radio show (RealAudio).

[ related topics: Politics Objectivism ]

Okay, can we just stop with the cutesie "Is Warren Beatty running for President?" crap? Yes, he's obviously running. He may drop out if he doesn't find support, but he's running. Otherwise he wouldn't be jerking around a bunch of stupid reporters. Although with supporters like Arianna Huffington one hopes that his hopes will tank hard and fast, we don't need anyone that far separated from reality getting media coverage. Good $DEITY, how bloody stupid do they think their audience is?

[ related topics: Interactive Drama Web development ]

Remember the Rodents Of Unusual Size in The Princess Bride? The Capybara has a body length of 42-53", weighs 77 to 140 lbs, and lives 8-10 years.

Debra Hyde's diary entry asks what if underwear were sized like bras?

[ related topics: Interactive Drama Sexual Culture ]

Dang it, I try to avoid exposing myself to a lot of the attitudes that Dave Winer of Scripting News has because I don't like that way of looking at life, but occasionally he comes up with some really great resources, like the origin of Murphy's Law, and Stapp's Ironical Paradox: "The universal aptitude for ineptitude makes any human accomplishment an incredible miracle."

[ related topics: Web development Dave Winer ]

Ouch: NASA's metric confusion caused Mars orbiter loss. This whole damned metric thing is nothing but trouble. Why should be give up a system God gave the English for one invented by a Frenchman?

[ related topics: Religion ]

Just in case you wanted to know what C2 evaluation means (and so far as anyone can tell, it's only NT 3.51 in a stand-alone workstation without a floppy drive that's got it, despite Microsoft's claims to the contrary).

[ related topics: Language Books Microsoft ]

In the race between the programmers building smarter software and the universe building dumber idiots, the universe is winning.

QOTD:

"Maintaining a sufficient stock of booze and partying supplies is likely to be the real Y2K problem, so we'd better get started on it right away."

--- Jim Rogers

[ related topics: Quotes ]

The image trend continues with a tree in Yosemite Valley taken in May, I think, of '98. More eco-porn, but a 10"x16" of it made at least one visitor gasp.

[ related topics: Photography Yosemite ]

A new NETFUTURE starts by looking at several articles on education:

The only thing an intelligent child can do with a complete toy is take it apart. An incomplete toy lets children use their imaginations.

--- An anonymous Waldorf kindergarten teacher, quoted from the September 1999 Atlantic Monthly in NETFUTURE #94

[ related topics: Children and growing up Web development Technology and Culture ]

As a follow up to that geeks as autists article and the Shadow Syndromes book, Peter forwards this huge array of links on the burgeoning labeling of everyone with a syndrome. I'll be working through these slowly. And my skepticism of modern psychiatric practics remains in place, no matter what labels I embrace...

http://www.usnews.com/usnews/issue/971027/27john.htm

http://www.seattletimes.com/ex...rowse/html97/altshad_082297.html

http://www.cjnetworks.com/~cgr...ych/boom_in_psych_syndromes.html

http://www.clark.net/pub/crn/97/08.htm

http://www.mind-set.com/html/pages/shadsynd.htm

http://www.latimes.com/HOME/NE...SCIENCE/MEDICINE/t000078745.html

http://www.addresources.org/syndrome.htm

[ related topics: Books Psychology, Psychiatry and Personality ]

Saw Orgazmo last night while waiting for some disks to fsck (oddly appropriate). Was actually kind of enjoyable. Relative to some movies I've seen I've no idea why the reviews were so bad. Not a great movie by any means, but in the "Mormon boy goes to LA, turns to acting in porn films, and becomes a superhero" genre I thought it comported itself fairly well:

Chota Boy: Stop, he's never gonna want to have an orgasm again!

Orgasmo: One more for Jesus.

[ related topics: Religion Humor Erotic Sexual Culture ]

And Hoyt Axton is dead at 61.

Jeremiah was a bullfrog,

was a good friend of mine.

Never understood a single thing he said,

but I helped him to drink his wine.

My friend Charlene got me one of these black tomatoes that has been making the rounds. If you get a chance, mortgage your house to buy one. They're amazing, and apparently at farmer's markets in the Marin area, probably elsewhere too. Very dark color, slightly greenish around the stem area is okay, and amazingly sweet and rich. Highly recommended.

[ related topics: Interactive Drama Dan's Life ]

A high school writing assignment I could have gotten into: If you had to assassinate one famous person who is alive right now, who would it be and how would you do it? Needless to say, assorted clueless parents are outraged.

[ related topics: Children and growing up Interactive Drama ]

Via /.: Todd was asking about digital cameras, and I pointed him towards the Nikon 950 based on recommendations from people I know, but he'd be missing out, he could play old arcade games on the Kodak DC265 Digita Camera.

[ related topics: Photography Games ]

Interesting Salon article about Whisper Numbers, and how this relates to Whispernumber.com which takes amateur investor's data and insight. The whisper number is the real number bandied about Wall Street, and is usally off from the "analysts projections". When analyzing this sort of thing, of course the first thing you should do is look at the economic reasons for there to be two sets of numbers. Not that I'm suggesting anything about people with stakes in the markets who are giving information to others with much larger stakes in the markets, and why their answers might differ and be largely less correct than the numbers given by people who aren't looking at the bigger picture and are just tracking the data given out by the company...

[ related topics: Web development ]

Studies suggest modern primates, Neanderthals mated screams the CNN headline. Heck, I didn't have to do carbon dating and DNA analysis to figure that out, just a quick look at Congress will tell you that and a whole lot more.

[ related topics: Politics Web development ]

David Steinberg's Comes Naturally #89 has made it to the archive, about sexual photography coming of age.

[ related topics: Web development Photography Erotic Sexual Culture ]

Oh, to follow up my comments about XML-RPC, I suppose I ought to put up or shut up and post some code. Here's a Perl fragment to get book info from Barnes & Noble, Amazon and Borders. Run it in a directory with a file called "isbn", one number per line. It's not massively smart, there are a few problems, and some interesting issues show up in the database differences between those three samples, but it's a quick hack to play with some data reaping ideas and learn a bit more about good ways to extract data.

[ related topics: Web development Books Content Management ]

Did some single malt tasting last night, a bunch from Glenmorangie. Had probably the most expensive scotch I'll ever drink, and reaffirmed that I like 'em smokey and peaty, smooth (at least in this drink) is wasted on me. Went to see The Limey afterwards to help sober up. Interesting editing style, one turn story line, the editing managed to drag what would have been a neat short out to something that became tedious.

The new Clean Sheets starts out with the Fat Broad on revenge sex.

[ related topics: Erotic Sexual Culture ]

Per user request I've made a PDA friendlier version of Flutterby, just the last two days worth. I've also shortened the main page, figuring y'all drop by at least once a week anyway.

[ related topics: Web development ]

Keith Knight tackles the rising host of health care.

[ related topics: Humor Web development ]

Via FactoVision, the Roton prototype made its third test flight yesterday. Phil and I saw the hangar in Mojave on our trip to Joshua Tree this summer, a bunch of us would love to lease a plane and have Sam fly us down there for one of the flights if we could get advance notice.

[ related topics: Interactive Drama Web development Cool Science ]

http://www.cs.umass.edu/~olc/dejapower.html

[ related topics: Web development ]

A new Mouthorgan on gender issues.

[ related topics: Sexual Culture ]

Dang it, I had a mid-sized update for y'all this morning and didn't get to send it 'cause in the midst of finally getting my new server up and running I ended up with some ethernet card config issues.

Via Camworld who got it from Obscure Store, a Boston public access show that's raising eyebrows. What catapulted the show Crapfest to notoriety was an episode on which they used a chicken to demonstrate cunnilingus techniques.

"They howl at suggestions that they are giving good people bad ideas. To demonstrate how absurd they think this allegation is, one recent Crapfest segment showed Taylor's 73-year-old father watching the show, retreating to his kitchen, removing a chicken from the refrigerator, and massaging it with a vibrator."

[ related topics: Cameron Barrett Web development ]

Since TS2: Toy Harder will be my second movie credit (just kidding about that title, BTW), this seems apropos: Landover Baptist weighs in with their review of Toy Story 2:

"A stomach-turning tale so sexually offensive, even that ungodly crippled pervert Larry Flynt would hurl his fat little body from his wheelchair to avoid seeing it!"

Personally I think it's a stronger story than either Toy Story or A Bug's Life, with much more visual complexity than the latter. It won't be a deep film, but it will be an entertaining one.

[ related topics: Pixar Web development Animation ]

It's been a long time since I've had a Scary Devil Monastery QOTD:

I love the way Microsoft follows standards. In much the same manner that fish follow migrating caribou.

--- Paul Tomblin

[ related topics: Quotes Microsoft ]

Garth, who requested the PDA friendly version of Flutterby, pointed me to the AvantGo Style Guide.

[ related topics: Web development ]

Atlas Shrugged coming to TNT as a miniseries. I don't know whether to be elated or scared, Ted Turner isn't the guy I'd have picked to put this one on.

[ related topics: Objectivism ]

Scary Devil Monastery QOTD:

"Was it Bill Hicks who said that some people should just be legal to hunt?"

--- Mike Sphar

"Yes, but who wants to eat diseased meat ???"

--- Keith Glass

[ related topics: Quotes ]

QOTminute, nicely explains why if I were a Christian I'd be a satan worshipper:

"Of all tyrannies, a tyranny exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It may be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end, for they do so with the approval of their consciences."

--- C.S. Lewis

[ related topics: Religion Interactive Drama ]

I'm told that Need To Know is up, time to go see if I was lied to.

[ related topics: Interactive Drama ]

Netscape Communicator 4.61 for Irix has Flash built in. I discovered this via http://www.cotse.com/games/ which includes games such as Bill Boxer, the Hamster Death takeoff on Hamster Dance and Lamer Hunter.

[ related topics: Games ]