Posts from — October 2005

I was reading through some old emails tonight (I have them stored from all the way back to Sept 2001). It’s interesting how much my writing has changed… I wrote “Learning from MSDN is like trying to pick all of the green fuzz off of a tennis ball ” in an email to a coworker. I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t write something like that anymore. I’m reading these emails, and were it not for the FROM field, I’d think someone else wrote them.

It’s neat to look through my sent emails folder… just glancing at it gives a good representation of what I occupied my time with back then.

I also found this email that I forwarded to my roommate freshman year… no idea where it came from:

Day number 180

8:00 am – OH BOY! DOG FOOD! MY FAVORITE!
9:30 am – OH BOY! A CAR RIDE! MY FAVORITE!
9:40 am – OH BOY! A WALK! MY FAVORITE!
10:30 am – OH BOY! A CAR RIDE! MY FAVORITE!
11:30 am – OH BOY! DOG FOOD! MY FAVORITE!
12:00 noon – OH BOY! DADDY BURPED! MY FAVORITE!
1:00 pm OH BOY! THE YARD! MY FAVORITE!
4:00 pm – OH BOY! DADDY FARTED! MY FAVORITE!
5:00 PM – OH BOY! DOG FOOD! MY FAVORITE!
5:30 PM – OH BOY! MOM! MY FAVORITE!
> >
> >> >Day number 181

8:00 am – OH BOY! DOG FOOD! MY FAVORITE!
9:30 am – OH BOY! A CAR RIDE! MY FAVORITE!
9:40 am – OH BOY! A WALK! MY FAVORITE!
10:30 am – OH BOY! A CAR RIDE! MY FAVORITE!
11:30 am – OH BOY! DOG FOOD! MY FAVORITE!
12:00 noon – OH BOY! DADDY BELCHED! MY FAVORITE!
1:00 pm OH BOY! THE YARD! MY FAVORITE!
4:00 pm – OH BOY! DADDY FARTED! MY FAVORITE!
5:00 PM – OH BOY! DOG FOOD! MY FAVORITE!
>5:30 PM – OH BOY! MOM! MY FAVORITE!
> >
> >> >Day number 182
8:00 am – OH BOY! DOG FOOD! MY FAVORITE!
9:30 am – OH BOY! A CAR RIDE! MY FAVORITE!
9:40 am – OH BOY! A WALK! MY FAVORITE!
10:30 am – OH BOY! A CAR RIDE! MY FAVORITE!
11:30 am – OH BOY! DOG FOOD! MY FAVORITE!
12:00 noon – OH BOY! DADDY BELCHED AND BURPED! MY FAVORITE!
1:00 pm OH BOY! THE YARD! MY FAVORITE!
1:30 pm – Oooooooh, bath. Bummer.
4:00 pm – OH BOY! DADDY FARTED! MY FAVORITE!
5:00 PM – OH BOY! DOG FOOD! MY FAVORITE!
5:30 PM – OH BOY! MOM! MY FAVORITE
>
> >> >EXCERPTS FROM A CAT’S DIARY
> >
> >> >DAY 752 – My captors continue to taunt me with bizarre little
>dangling objects. They dine lavishly on fresh meat, while I am
>forced to eat dry cereal. The only thing that keeps me going is
>the hope of escape, and the mild satisfaction I get from ruining
>the occasional piece of furniture…Tomorrow I may urinate upon
>another houseplant.
> >
>
> >> >DAY 761 – Today my attempt to kill my captors by weaving
>around their feet while they were walking almost succeeded; must
>try this at the top of the stairs. In an attempt to disgust and
>repulse these vile oppressors,I once again induced myself to vomit
>on their favorite chair…must try this on their bed.
> >
>
> >> >DAY 765 – Decapitated a mouse and brought them the headless
>body in attempt to make them aware of what I am capable of, and to
>try to strike fear into their hearts. They only cooed and
>condescended about what a good little cat I was… Not working
>according to plan.
> >
DAY 768 – I am finally aware of how sadistic they are. For no
>good reason I was chosen for the water torture. This time however
>it included a burning foamy chemical called “shampoo.” What sick
>minds could invent such a liquid. My only consolation is the piece
>of thumb still lodged between my teeth.
> >
> >> >
> >
> >> >DAY 771 – There was some sort of gathering of their
>accomplices. I was placed in solitary throughout the event,
>however, I could hear the noise and smell the foul odor of the
>glass tubes they call “beer.” More importantly I overheard that my
>confinement was due to MY power of “allergies.” Must learn what
>this is and how to use it to my advantage.
> >
> >> >
> >
> >> >DAY 774 – I am convinced the other captives are flunkies and
>may be snitches. The dog is routinely released and seems more than
>happy to return. He is obviously a slavish, obeisant half-wit. The
>bird, on the other hand, must undoubtedly be an informant as he
>speaks with them regularly. I am certain he reports my activities.
>Due to his current placement in the metal room his safety is
>assured. But I can wait. It is only a matter of time before his
>treachery ends.

I really need to start learning how to turn down opportunities and requests for things. I waste my time on a lot of things that I don’t need to.

I got an email tonight requesting that I show up for an 8am meeting at a plant somewhere. It didn’t say where the plant was located, but said to call a guy at extension 118 if I can’t make it. Sadly, the email didn’t give the guy’s phone number, so the extension is useless. I also have a new weekly time sheet to fill out. That’s the third one. Awesome.

I charge for the time I spend working on filling out all the paperwork, though, so whatever, it’s just subtracted from my actual work time.

I’ve spent a lot of time on the route editor for Runstoppable in the last couple of days. Tonight, having reached some sort of milestone, I decided to record a demo that you can watch here. It’s pretty short, but demonstrates the most important features. It uses Flash, so beware. Yeah, I actually made something in SWF. The demo works really well though. Feel free to leave feedback here or on the blog post.

Time to get back on this.

Pacing break was fun, I got to see my brother’s cross country team take first place at the Wickham Invitational (unseeded race). This is really big, since I’m sure it hasn’t happened in at least decades (if ever). They’re doing really well… unfortunately I won’t be able to see any more races this season.

The last week has been hugely enjoyable because of a lull in the volume of work, but I have to remember to switch back to work mode. Eventually.

Alumni weekend was great. As you’d expect, I got to see a bunch of people I hadn’t seen in a while. The football game against Yale was awesome (except for some of the marching). I got to have dinner at Sal’s with my parents and Brian after the game, but all the alumni stuff meant I couldn’t spend too much time with them.

I’ve been watching Freaks & Geeks a lot lately (there’s only one season, I have a few episodes left). It’s worth watching, I think. I just got a DVD burner last week, so if you are looking for any tv shows I have on my computer, transferring them is now more feasible.

“Some have argued that extremism has been strengthened by the actions of our coalition in Iraq, claiming that our presence in that country has somehow caused or triggered the rage of radicals. I would remind them that we were not in Iraq on September 11, 2001, and al-Qaida attacked us anyway.” -GWB

I just can’t imagine what’s going through a speechwriter’s head when they write something like that. Anyone with a college education should be able to see that it’s just a glaring error in logic. I wouldn’t even call that rhetoric, it’s just stupid.

To complete my quoting of Dirty Work:

“You fellas have a lot of growing up to do, I’ll tell you that. Ridiculous. Completely ridiculous. Can you believe these characters? Way out of line. Way out of line. Have a good mind to go to the warden about this. You know what hurts the most is the… the lack of respect. You know? That’s what hurts the most. Except for the… Except for the other thing. That hurts the most. But the lack of respect hurts the second most.”

I also took a “Personality Test” to aid my procrastination. Those questions were really hard to answer; I think it would be better to have a friend answer most of the questions instead. A lot of the answers change periodically, anyway, I think.

I should really study.

Tonight I was procrastinating and watching an episode of Numb3rs that I had downloaded instead of studying for my pattern recognition test. Soon after it started, I realized that the mathematical focus of the episode was Bayesian Decision Theory, the very topic I was procrastinating studying. The irony is so sweet I can taste it.

Sadly, this isn’t helping my studying at all, and is probably making me understand things less. That’s not to say that I don’t like a good math crime drama, though, one of my favorite shows used to be Mathnet.

“Earlier this year Google further encouraged responsible energy technologies by offering a cash incentive to employees who decide to purchase a fuel-efficient vehicle.”