">'); win.document.writeln(''); win.document.writeln(''); }
 

The Indefinite Article.

Wednesday, December 31, 2003

Happy New Year everyone!


Hoping that everyone has a happy and healthy beginning to 2004!

Feliz A�o Nuevo!!!!

HAPPY NEW YEAR

Happy New Year Y'ALL!!!!

run dmc

Tuesday, December 30, 2003

Facinating: MP3 Gym

MP3 Gym

iStop Motion?


todd: did you use istop motion to make that little animation?

Monday, December 29, 2003

We Made It!

i have long wondered if we would ever make the coveted 'Fresh Blogs' list, and we have.

this image captures our historic moment of triumph.

let all rejoice and celebrate this red letter day!

so do i.

 here ya go.


who needs iSight?

check this out. I mostly like how well (sort of) it loops.

Ichat

Can Someone please place the
aims' of
Paul.
Dave.
Todd.
and anyone that I cannot think of right now.

Sunday, December 28, 2003

Another low tech try


I was thinking that you could accomplish something by placing a small sized flat mirror directly behind the transparency. You would have to play around with the settings tho. If you only had a flatbed scanner w/o the transparency adapter, your scanning options would be limited.

Lazy Sunday


Whoever is reading this i'm sure that it is cloudy, cool, and occasionally rainy. That is the way it has been most of the day here in sugarland.

First thing this morning i had to search the car for a cache of diapers cause we frantically realized there wasn't a diaper in the house. Luckily for adolfo iv, his parents keep a loaded diaper bag in the car: enough, at least, to keep him dry for the rest of the day. I walked outside without shoes and realized quickly that it had rained that night. The car was pebbled with water drops.



Later that afternoon, the sun was out, but not for very long. I took advantage of it tho...



but then all of a sudden, the clouds rolled in. We spent the entire afternoon cleaning the house and playing with the baby...

MAYBE YOU HAVE ALREADY TRIED THIS AMBER.

Take your transpanency and place a white piece of paper behind it, put them on the scanner close the lid and place something real heavy on the lid.

kinda low tech.

I'm sure the nerds on this blog will have technically correct approaches.


HAPPY TO ALL YE CHRISTMAS TO BE YES HAVING!!!!!


Saturday, December 27, 2003

Another day off


Adolfo IV slept like a rock after being at adolph's. Didn't wake up at all last night, but he did wake up at 7:30 and slap me in the arm to wake me up.

We got ourselves together pretty quickly cause carol had her xmas spa appointment @ 10 A.M.
Once we dropped off carol, the baby and i headed to whataburger for his favorite breakfast: eggs, potatoes, a patty of sausage and biscuit. We picked it up at the drive-thru and headed straight for adolph's place.

He ate only a couple of bites and explored every corner of adolph's apartment, as he always does. We decided to get him out of the house. We walked along the metrorail tracks and headed towards the fountains near the cancer survivors memorial. We kicked the soccer ball around, we ran through the grass ... we tired him out, totally.

When we made it back to adolph's both of them laid down on his 'bed' and went straight to sleep. It was cute. Unfortunately, i was charging the camera battery the whole time we were out (i'm buying a spare soon, or course.) By the time i got back, it was fully charged; however, he was asleep....



2 1/2 hours later...



We picked up mom and went stright to eat at Jason's Deli. He devoured his lunch and basked in his mom's love. It's always so satisfying to see them together after they haven't seen each other for so long.

Friday, December 26, 2003

A relaxing day at dolph's and the museum




Lunch and a nice overcast day out at the sculpture garden in front of the Glassel School of Art. Waiting for paul to arrive; even brent (from germany) may show up. A nice nice lazy lazy day.

I Installed CS




InDesign has a toolbar now. So, does that make you happy todd?

The file browser in Photoshop is really nice too. I didn't make all that thorough of a check, but i think the automate option now resides in the file browser exclusively.

Today: Halo!

Thursday, December 25, 2003

Driving to Shreveport

A picture every five minutes during the drive from Houston to Shreveport. 1.2 meg movie.

Merry Christmas


7:19 A.M. - woke up to my son's smile. Carol took him to grandma's bedroom to wake her up. I took that opportunity to slip a couple of gifts i had been hiding in my sock drawer under the tree. We all opened gifts and emptied our stockings. The baby went straight for the new car, which was recently assembled (1 a.m.) the previous night. He loved it.



Carol was happy with her digital camera



I came away with an armload of new clothes and a couple of cool books.

We had a great breakfast and headed to my sister's house with a carload of presents. Diego really liked his automatic chocolate milk mixer cup, and dezma had a blast with her shopping cart once it was put together.

My sister also made a full breakfast with fresh tortillas.

Then, off to my aunt cynthia's house, where we are now. The baby came away with a toy car. Now, Carol is putting him down to sleep and I am losing energy, fast.

very fast....

Merry Christmas!


Wednesday, December 24, 2003

congratulations diana

and beautiful gingerbread men!

Gingerbread Man!


I have been spending the last couple of days up Denver with the folks. The whole family is together and we have been having a blast. As usual we had a lot of fun with Gingerbread. Check out this movie (3.3 MB) and witness one of the Mercado Family Christmas traditions!

Low-bandwith stills can be found here.

Also, Merry Christmas and/or Happy Holidays to All!



Tuesday, December 23, 2003

The whole damn family is sick


Took the boy to the doctor yesterday. The official diagnosis is croup.

He's got a horrible cough that wakes him up everytime he hacks while he's sleeping. His little body became hot with fever in the middle of the night and we had to struggle to give him medicine. Then, he gagged on one of his coughs right after he had nursed and threw up all over the bed.

Changed all the sheets.

Luckily work was dead. totally dead. the hospital was empty. I was let go at noon...and the xmas break begins.

Scan This

Thanks for all the feedback -- I'll try leaving the scanner lid open first to see if I can save a buck or two. Happy holidays everyone!!

big brains

Diana is the smartest girl in the world.

Upon completion of her first (and hardest) semester of PA school her grades were reported as a perfect 4.0.


i mean, damn, check out the big brain on diana.

Monday, December 22, 2003

Scannerz

I was thinking the easiest thing to do is to leave the lid open, letting the sun light up the transparency. But what do I know? Maybe you could concentrate the powers of the sun with a mirror or a magnifying glass. You could practice "burn the ants" with your scanner head!

Killy, Todd, remember that old hand held SCSI scanner? Whatever happened to that old thing?

Firefight, firefight, firefight!




Once everyone gets back from holiday, we've got to take this guy out.

Signing our names in, o, maybe 12 more months?


I figured i should keep this around in case adolph or i have to sign up.

Quick Reading list for the xmas week


I've picked up a good book recently:

1. Brunelleschi's Dome



Fillippo Brunelleschi was a goldsmith and clockmaker that would essentially re-discover architectural principals used by the ancient romans thereby revolutionizing the then current method of dome building used throughout europe: gothic flying buttresses and wooden centering. The dome of the Santa Maria del Fiore church in Florence was originally conceived by Neri di Fioravanti in the mid 1300's that included a dome that would be the highest vault ever constructed.

At the time of conception, no one really knew how it would be built.

It's been a super-interesting read so far. There is a good amount of history and a lot of recognizable characters that put a lot of other things i've read into perspective (the medici's, donatello, giotto, etc...)

I actually bought it as a xmas gift for my cousin who is going to be travelling in italy soon, but i read the first chapter at Borders and was hooked. Carol found a used copy for about 1/2 the price online at amazon and ordered it for me.

The second book is a Kenzaburo Oe title that i hadn't seen before: Rouse Up O Young Men of the New Age! (exclamation point included)

It's a father-son/father of the father-father relationship book. Will report when i get into this one.

Adolph is exactly right.


The easiest thing to do would be to get a print made from that slide and then scan it.

Transparency Adapter

A transparency adapter is typically a scanner lid with a light built into it. I think the reason for it is that the transparency is not as reflective as a piece of paper. The light in the lid shines though the transparency and allows the scanner sensor to pick up the full wealth of colors in the transparency.

Hmmmm

Yes, it's a flatbed -- I'm not sure about the transparency adapter -- I'm looking all over the scanner and I don't see anything like that -- is that something I have to buy separately?

Lots of questions


amber: what kind of scanner were you using? was it a flatbed? is there a transparency adapter on it?

Photoshop

Does anyone out there know how to scan an image from a transparency into Photoshop? We tried scanning at 600 dpi in color and it came out very opaque and black. Is there a trick to the configurations, or possibly the method of scanning?

Gotta love FARK.com

Sunday, December 21, 2003

Am I the only one. . .

. . . enjoying reading Apple's "Pro" user interview series?
Apple - Pro/Film - Walter Murch: "The other thing is we shot and printed 600,000 feet of film, which is about 113 hours of material. The film is 2 hours 30 minutes long, so that's a 30 or 40 to 1 ratio. The first time we put it all together it was over 5 hours long. So you find more inventive ways to compress the story to find out what can be eliminated that not only doesn’t affect the story, but actually, by its elimination, improves things by putting into juxtaposition things that formerly were not. It was a very complex orchestration, shrinking it by half."

Friday, December 19, 2003

headin' out.

hey everybody, we're going to lubbock!


if there is an uglier name for a town out there please let me know.


merry christmas and all of that. we are planning a trip to houston after christmas some time. details to follow.

Thursday, December 18, 2003

Who is making the plunge?

Mac Rumors: Apple Mac Rumors and News You Care About
Non rumor news: Mac OS X 10.3.2, Quicktime 6.5, iTunes 4.2, Battery Update, is anyone installing all of these things? I've heard good feedback about battery update, I don't trust the feedback about 10.3.2 yet, and I'm really wary of Quicktime 6.5 and iTunes 4.2, more out of "if it ain't broke don't fix it" mentality than anything else.

LOTR And The Positronic Brain


Killy, Carol, Adolph and I saw LOTR too last night. Even though some of my favorite scenes from the book didn't make the cut (like the scene where the King of the Nazgul busts in the gate at Minis Tirith exclaiming "heeeeeer's the Witch King" a la the Shinning) I still enjoyed most of the 3.5 hours. I even liked Peter Jackson's additions: like that scene right before the battle for Minis Tirith where the Orc General notices that one of the new orc recruits is scared and so he tells him the story about how he used to be a dentist specializing in Troll Orthodontics and General Goblin Orthondonistry and that he ran a modest practice up in northern Morder until one day a Troll patient woke up too soon from the anaesthesia and bit his hand off, leaving only a misshapen, lumpy stump. I think it is great that Jackson added a scene like that to show that hey, orcs are just these guys you know?

Also, If you were intrigued by the I ROBOT commercial then you may like this book. And if you have some time this Christmas holiday for some more reading I suggest you read the rest of the robot series starting with The Caves Of Steel and ending with The Naked Sun (or maybe even Robots and Empire - but that is only worth it, I think, if you read the Foundation Series ...). Not only are they interesting sci-fi detective stories but they also offer valuable insights into robot culture/behaviour. I definitely see my robotic household assistant in a different light now that I have read these books!

Check out the real thing here.

Wednesday, December 17, 2003

Oh MY GOD.

Saw the LOTR last night at Midnight....
Took my mind off of EVERYTHING for a good 3.5 hrs.
Saw this commercial.....
I ROBOT NOW

MacDevCenter.com: Elementary Computer Graphics: Drawing with Pixels [Dec. 16, 2003]

MacDevCenter.com: Elementary Computer Graphics: Drawing with Pixels [Dec. 16, 2003]
I don't think it isn't too early to start, Killy.

Baby's first joke

Killito: Knock Knock
Mom: Who's there?
Killito: In the...
Mom: In the who?
Killito: Egg Nog

Mom: In the egg nog?

Tuesday, December 16, 2003

The Hair Brush Plugin For Photoshop


Has been a boon for digital photographers everywhere.

Beliefs and Lies


Yahoo! News - Cardinal Says U.S. Treated Saddam 'Like a Cow'
: "despite all the heavy blame he bears"

Yeah, because he isn't going to hell, or some other supernatural punishment meted out conveniently post-mortem by the invisible man, just like all the other tyrants aided and abetted by the Vatican over its time on this earth.

This morning I was thinking, "how is it that Juan Williams thinks he is going to get anything close to the truth asking about intellegence gleaned from Saddam?" Lets see, government official will just spurt out "oh yeah, Juan, Saddam told us . . . , and Saddam told us . . . and as a result our work is nearly done." Does Williams think that government officials are evil villians to his smooth NPR James Bond and they are going to give away their plot?

Monday, December 15, 2003

Egg Nog?


Can anything else besides eggs be nogged?


macosxhints - 10.3: View Expos� animation in slow motion

macosxhints - 10.3: View Expos� animation in slow motion
You know, some things are so obvious that you'd think you would have known them all along, but then someone comes along and reminds you of something you didn't know but fits like a jigsaw puzzle-piece into everything else you knew. In any case, it is really cool to hit , and on completion, hit . So Cool, then hit again and lather, rinse, repeat.

Tagg

I am sorry to hear of your loss Taggart. My Grandfather died just last month. I know it means much to your grandmother to have you there to help her. My family and I will say a prayer for your family.

Hey Killy, Where's your hair?

Seems like you need to ask santa for some rogaine,


SUCKA.

image well test


Spiderman Can!


I invite you to check out this trailer for the next Spiderman movie. It is gauranteed to brighten your day!

Also ImageWell is super neat! Definitely the way to upload images to the blog ... it even puts the html img on the clipboard for you!

100 * G5 * 3.5 gig RAM =


Apple - Pro/Film - John D. Lowry
A hunnert G5's with 3.5 gigs of RAM each. . . .

Prayer

Taggart,
May you and your mother be infused with strength to make it through a sorrowful time.

xtralean.com: Image Well

Image Well
Very well executed application. Paul, you should check this out.

my heart goes out to your family

I am praying for your family and tell your mom I am praying for her to find strength after having gone through that.
Your grandmother is in a better place.
Good luck and lot's of love.

Condolences


Taggart: So sorry to hear about your grandmother and even more sorry that your mother had to see your gran go out that way. I am eternally thankful that my mother just watched my grandmother take her last breath as she was sleeping in a hospital bed. I know my mother wouldn't have been able to handle what your mother went through.

Our prayers go to your grandmother and mother. Be careful driving to the valley and return to us healthy.

Tired

Saturday Night after running the Trail of Lights here in Austin
my Brother called me and told me my Grandamother had just died.
Liz and I packed quickley and drove that night and arrived at 3:30 am.
My Mother was very distraught being the initial witness to my Grandma's heart failure
and having to perform CPR.
We spent the morning making the arrangments.
The funeral is going to be Tuesday morning.
We left the Valley after 6:30 p.m.
it is now 3 to One.
I have a big day of work ahead of me tommorrow and it is my official anniversary.
We are heading back late tomorrow night.
For those of you who pray please say a prayer for my Grandmother, my Mother and my family.
I hope all of you are doing well.

Saturday, December 13, 2003

Priceless

I was thinking it was going to be "Being uncouth at every course of the meal . . . Priceless!"

Happy Anniversary this 15th Taggart and Liz!

Friday, December 12, 2003

2 YR Anniversary

Driskell Grill
1st Coarse
Seared Hudson Valley Foie Gras & Hot Smoked Bandera Quail 30$
2nd Coarse
Quail Terrine & Wild Mushroom Salad 26$
3rd Coarse
Lamb Chops & Roasted Duck 72$
Bottle of Wine 48$
Creme Brulee & Chocolate Truffle 13$

Pleasure of Writing 223 Dollar Anniversary Dinner to
Mark Knight's House Account PRICELESS!!!!!

nice name guys

boys will be boys

blogPile

sounds like something Adolph would take glee in talking about, in a lowered voice followed by not so discreet chuckling.

nikon capture


Killy i lied to you.

i am a cur, a retch, cad and rake.

it turns out that paul does not, in fact, have a copy of nikon capture.

please forgive my transgression.

Dave's vCard

Anybody have Dave's home address? It is missing on my vCard of him. I guess it would be the same as Mr. Serpa's old address....

Thursday, December 11, 2003

Surgery!


Our buddy Dave is having surgery tomorrow. It seems that the organs in his body are being terrorized by a gall-bladder gone rogue. The Doctors have decided that a pemptive strike is the best way to insure Dave's safety. The operation will happen sometime tomorrow morning...

Also, I am posting this from the Kraftsmen Bakery on Montrose. Here there 3 wireless networks to chose from!

Jeffrey Zeldman Presents: If Filmmakers Were Web Designers II

Jeffrey Zeldman Presents: If Filmmakers Were Web Designers II
I read this thinking, if filmmakers were web designers then the web would probably have big text that scrolls off into space....

Bjork Concert Videos

BJORK CONCERT FLASH, cool.

My Morning Commute

I velcro-ed the iSight to the sun screen of the Beetle today, and caputured my morning commute.

My favorite


My favorite bad word emerged from meagan and my banter. If i remember correctly, that day she had greeted me with a particularly mean insult. i can't remember it exactly but it was mean. as i was leaving the apt (on burleson) later that day i hugged her and whispered in her ear: clitless whore.

she was devastated.

adolph: what the hell is dromedary's sun?

Wednesday, December 10, 2003

All the bad words I can think of test

Fuck fuck fuckity fuck shit damn dam SCO bitch dromedary's sun.

Nope, seems like Blogger doesn't filter anything.

Fights and design


My sister, barbara, got suspended at school for getting into a fight. It really wasn't much of a fight, just some pushing around and punches at the air. No one was hurt, but two mother's were smokin' mad, especially mine!

I was joking with barbara and did a search for a black eye (she doesn't have one) and came across this site that i think todd might like.

GREETINGS PHOTOGRAPHERS AT LARGE, and anyone else who has info

My darling brother, Miguel, aka Mike, (I think all of you met him) is considering starting a little business in Lockport. He asks this question...

Now that I have time, I want to look at info on shutter speed,
aperture, etc. Do you know any books or web sites on this?


So I asked him this...
What kind of computer do you have at home? A DELL
Have you considered Digital photography? YES
What type of business are you thinking of starting up? Portraits & portfolios
Do you already have a camera? If so, what kind is it? A digital camera. Kodak.


I don't know what other questions to ask him but I thought this might be helpful.
Can you gentlemen post your ideas on the Blog when you have some time?
Thanks!

Taggart.
I am impressed at how valiant you were in protecting your tender wife. I am sorry that you had to live through such a harrowing experience...that's pretty freaky stuff.
Be careful.

Pachanga?


Anyone heading to karl's pachanga this weekend?

Also, this is creepy.

Now THAT'S bad


Breakfast

one bowl of Fiber One.
one banana


Taggart and Liz Get out of there. I wouldn't waste a single day. Leave.

Had both a dentist and dr. appt today. My teeth are in dire need of cleaning, filling, building-up, and capping. I've got appt's spanned throughout the beginning months of 2004. My physical went well. No lumps, bumps, or otherwise obvious signs of disease. I might have some sort of allergy cause my nose is a little swollen (and i just thought it was big!) My next appt in two months will be an update on my cholesterol.

Ho Bat!

Plagued by troublesome 'women of the evening' or inebriated frat-boys?

You need the Ho Bat!

Constructed (in mexico) of all-American hardwoods the Ho Bat is compact enough to wield effectively in hallways and living rooms, yet sturdy enough to bring a maddened hooker under control in short order!

Order yours Today!


not a real product, please do not attempt to order

Armagetron

This game is so bad-ass. So simple, yet so fun, think of it like competition Tetris on speed.

LightCycles




Not spending eneogh time in front of a computer? Then check out Armagetron, the super fun Tron LightCycle game!
Adolph and I tried it out over a LAN last night and had a blast.



Hooker Blaster!

 

(This post is satire; it does not condone violence against anyone, including but not limited to sex workers, alleged crack addicts or obviously drunk white college students; nor does it imply a besmirchment of community-based policing or direct action.)

i know what i am getting taggart...

for christmas.

jeez tag, that's screwed up. there must be somewhere else you can live for a similar price that does not involve so much wildlife.

on the plus side; you are getting valuable experience in dealing with random, chaotic events in a cool, detached manner.

i am pretty sure that two police reports will earn you a 'get out of my lease free' card.

and rabid crack 'ho's running amuk in the living room is far more stressful than raccoon carcasses, i promise.

Interview Story

Guy gets job offers from Amazon and Microsoft.

Tuesday, December 09, 2003

That is Awful Taggart

Reactions from around the world:

"If you don't feed them, they won't come around, you know?"

"That's what happens when Metro comes to your neighborhood. . ."

"Tell your brother to get less psycho girlfriends!"

"White college kids, huh? Maaan, that is a fucked up 'hood."

"At least it isn't a flea infested racoon under your house . . ."

616 St John.

Twice Since I have lived at 616 I have had to call the cops.
The first time was in August.
At 3 am I heard footsteps on my front porch.
I get up go outside.
There are three drunk white college kids sitting on my front porch.
WHAT THE FUCK.
I tell them that I am going to count to three and that they had better get the
fuck off my porch.
I made it to two and then they saw my brother and tore ass out of there.
Tonight.
Liz and I are watching Two Towers and then we hear screaming.
not screaming in a Nosgul kind of in the distance but
on my front porch front door opening screaming running through my house.
Then at the door of my bedroom banging screaming doorknob turning
screaming leap out of my bed stopping big fat crack whore from
coming into my fucking room.
Crack whore screaming that a man is chasing her with a gun.
ME screaming get the fuck out of my house.
HEART pounding woman pounding on my door.
She runs into my brothers room (how fun is that).
.......................................................................
I dont know what she has drugs gun knife I was just barracading the door.
Once I heard that she went into my brothers room I ran out grabed the phone
passed it to liz and 911 started to happen.
She convinces my brother to call 911
Lock Liz and I in the bathroom.
Bang on the front door of the Police.
Strung out Crack whore is hallucinating.
Police intervention.
I am getting out of this place




CS Fun

"I think audioblogging would be cool if you could like make fart noises on it," says me.

"You better get AppleCare . . ." says Paul.

So I got CS in today and haven't done anything but install it, as I've been in meetings. I was thinking it would have been cool to take "box opening" pictures, but I didn't bring the camera today. So this post is confirmation that CS is here, it installed and I haven't opened up anything yet.

Adobe CS Pro

Dec 9, 2003

5:12 A.M.
HOUSTON, TX, US
OUT FOR DELIVERY

5:05 A.M.
HOUSTON, TX, US
ARRIVAL SCAN

2:45 A.M.
HOUSTON, TX, US
DEPARTURE SCAN

1:58 A.M.
HOUSTON, TX, US
ARRIVAL SCAN

Dec 8, 2003
9:39 P.M.
MESQUITE, TX, US
DEPARTURE SCAN

3:30 P.M.
MESQUITE, TX, US
ORIGIN SCAN

Dec 5, 2003
5:20 A.M.
US

BILLING INFORMATION RECEIVED
Whoah, almost here....

Funny


I think this is funny

Monday, December 08, 2003

shoot today

Took pictures of Sara Sharp today.
She plays at Momo's every Monday. or something.

Adobe CS Pro

Dec 08, 2003 �

03:30:30 PM �
MESQUITE TX US �
ORIGIN SCAN �

Dec 05, 2003 �
05:20:03 AM �
US �
BILLING INFORMATION RECEIVED �

Dec 04, 2003 �
07:47:29 AM �
Campbellsville KY USA �
SHIPPED

Getting closer....

Powerbook G4 15in Alum Take-Apart

Powerbook G4 15in Alum Take-Apart
Interesting, the PB G4 15" has two fans...

46th & Ramsey (off of Burnet) Close to Central Market

There is a garage apartment behind my bosses House.
I think rent is 550$ a month.....
I will place post pictures of it later this afternoon.

Sunday, December 07, 2003

Room For Rent in Austin


A friend of mine just got a job at Saint Edwards Hospital and will be moving to Austin at the end of December. She will be looking for an apartment/room to rent. Anybody know of anybody who needs a roommate ? Anybody know of any nice/cheap/clean place opening up to rent? Lemmee know what you can!

Saturday, December 06, 2003

Will Somebody Please Chop Off My Head


My Gosh The Last Samurai was one long, horrible movie. I mean, there were a few neat looking samurai sword flashing fight scenes, and a ninja attack, and a couple of big battles, but the director makes you pay dearly for these brief moments by dragging you through a story of unparalled lousiness.Thank god I only had a straw and a stick of gum handy during the ordeal or I would have ritually disemboweled myself. Surely the pain of slicing my guts open and feeling them spill out into my hands and then onto the theatre floor and then stepping on them and seeing the bloody mess mix with dropped popcorn and spilled soda would have been less than the agony of watching this film. And the ending! My Lord, the ending was so excrutiatingly, mind-boggingly bad that only my incredible tolerance for pain, and amazing physical endurance kept me from slipping into blessed unconsciousness. Even thinking about it now makes me want to wretch.

Friday, December 05, 2003

Ready,Set,Go! for Mac OS X

Ready,Set,Go!
Too bad it is too late to stop shipment of Adobe CS . . . not.

Interesting Writeup about iTunes Music Store encryption

Chaosmint :: QTFairUse, MyTunes, and Protected AAC Explained

Cancer

Congrats!!!!
Does this mean that if I have a tumor in the middle of my chest you
can remove it.???

Come home!


Adolph: how long are you going to be out of town?

Dr. G's poster of mediastinal lesions won the magnu cum laude award at RSNA!






Canasta Blasta!


Does anybody know how to play or want to learn how to play Canasta? It is a really fun group card game that requires the usual bit of luck and a tad bit of strategy and brain power as well. I think we should try it out the next time we all get together! My family (on my mother's side) used to play it a bunch when I was growing up. Most of the games ended peaceably enough, but every once in a while tea-cups and saucers got thrown around, but that has mostly to do with the egg-nog and/or white-russians that accompanied the holiday games more than anything about the game itself...

PB 12" Proc Speed Discrepancy

macosxhints - Display your CPU's true speed:

"I ran Xbench on CPU test only and after several dozen tries, got an average of about 98.3 (It varies slightly). I than shutdown my powerbook, and reset the PMU. When I started it back up and logged into my special account and did a sysctl hw.cpufrequency test again, this time it said my CPU was running at 866MHz. Much better. I then ran Xbench again, and guess what. I got the EXACT same scores. Somewhere around 98.3. So, what does this tell me? sysctl doesn't tell you anything. Ignore it."
I'm glad some people are reasonably empirical.

breakfast (?)


two cigarettes
6 cups of coffee

Mary Jane & Ted Leo


Breakfast:

1 banana
1 egg beater egg
1 wheat toast
12 oz apple juice


I got to mary janes at about 8:15. I tried to stop by my old place to see if eric was around, but he was teaching. It was like travelling to another life seeing the old place; passing by taggart's old place; knowing that todd & little 'D' used to live just on the other side of cecil's...sigh.

They didn't let us in for about half an hour. A handful of us waited outside.

Two bands were up before ted leo: spame an orange and the joggers (from portland). I wondered if Colin knew about this band.

Orange had a Ben Folds flavor. I say that cause a piano was the lead instrument. Played maybe 6 or 7 songs. Eric called right as they were finishing up. He decided to join me once he got back into town from his teaching gig in league city.

The joggers were allright. It was loud and mary janes was small. Eric showed up about halfway through their set.



Ted Leo started off his set solo. He belted out a tune i hadn't heard before. The band joined him and played Where have all the rude boys gone? Most of the tunes were off of Hearts of Oak. He played one tune off the first album i had heard of his (don't know the name of it.)

I was able to take a bunch of video! Here is one of his final tunes; something i hadn't heard before. It's a little big, but i think we've all got fast lines.

Food

Man, you guys eat A LOT of food in the morning!! How do you boys stay so thin eating the way you do? Here's what I have for breakfast:

1 bowl of high-fiber cereal

OR

1 bowl of oatmeal with a banana and some dried cranberries

OR

1 low-carb milkshake with a spoonful of peanut butter

OR

scrambled eggs, toast, and an espresso

Thursday, December 04, 2003

Narnia Next


Thanks to the huge success of LOTR production is moving forward on a live-action version of The Chronicles of Narnia. Production will be based out of, you guessed it, New Zealand and will employ much of the LOTR crew.

Also, checkout this article over at Salon.com on the relationship between C.S Lewis and ol' J.R.R.


Failure!


I tried a couple of times to install Panther on Dave's box (G4 450 640) ... only to have the install hang on the "Preparing Installation" phase. I upgraded his OS to 10.2.8 and tried again only to have the exact same problem!

The Great Binder


I know that everyone has been wondering about my breakfasts so here is a rundown:

  • 1 serving of Twist Donut - Because they are so tasty and I feel that they fill me up

  • 1 serving of Banana - Because of the Potassium and because they are mild

  • 2 servings of (string) Cheese - Because cheese is The Great Binder

  • 1 serving of Grapefruit - For the refreshing juice of goodness, and the Vitamin C.

  • Total Cost: $1.29


Wednesday, December 03, 2003

Nikon - D70 Press Release

I guess this is designed to compete with that Cannon digital Rebel I saw on TV the other day...

?

Why were Killy's words Ill-Advised?
If everything worked out okay then THAT would mean they were WISE.

php.ini

The php.ini file is much more user friendly in the 10.3 distro--it actually has a findable one! Key trick is to sudo cp php.ini-dist php.ini, edit the php.ini and restart Apache.
CVS :: CVS Checkout of php.ini-dist (revision 1.201)

John Taylor Gatto

John Taylor Gatto Website:

"Our official assumptions about the nature of modern childhood are dead wrong. Children allowed to take responsibility and given a serious part in the larger world are always superior to those merely permitted to play and be passive. At the age of twelve, Admiral Farragut got his first command. I was in fifth grade when I learned of this. Had Farragut gone to my school he would have been in seventh."
Sometimes I realize that I haven't been sharing my reading list; mostly this is because I don't really think about it as a reading list.

Funny you should mention....


I was just thinking about Mr. Green this morning. I was in the shower thinking of how bad a haircut i got last time.

I miss the time i spent in the chair at the bus station.

adolph ill-wisdom?

Tuesday, December 02, 2003

10.3 On

I updated today. It was incredibly stupid. I wanted to install GRASS, which needs an X windowing system and found that Apple's X11 needs 10.3. Oh, how I hate upgrade dependencies! Killy's words of ill-wisdom echoed in my head, "Just do the upgrade option and don't worry about it..." So I upgraded and everything seemed to work out fine. It even kept my MySQL installation and databases; it even kept my ColdFusion on Tomcat installation. Very nice considering that I threw caution to the wind and forgot to back that stuff up. So here I am this evening at Kaveh Kanes ready to voice chat with you guys!

Killy, Mr. Green says Hi.

Keeping Track of Stuff

I've been following the slow-moving SCO v. IBM suit for some time now. One of the really incredible things is how many records are kept in the world. I read this stuff and think, "Who thinks to keep track of this stuff?" Okay, I've been known to keep stuff (no longer is there a film can of clippings in my desk drawer though), but where do people keep this stuff and how do they keep it for so long?

you mean....?




you mean like firebombing the house of the arresting officer?

all kidding aside, stories like these really disturb me. i think if something like that ever happened to me, i would really go off the deep end. i have too much anger inside of me...

Police Brutality

I think that the only way for stuff like this to stop is for the people affected to directly affect the lives of the people doing the arresting.

Monday, December 01, 2003

Check out:


These beautiful fotos

I was a Halberdier!


If anyone hasn't noticed, in the slide show of my thanksgiving weekend there is a photo of me (right after the Mammoth) wearing a replica of a Spanish breastplate and holding onto a 'Halberd'. The photo is a little far away so i'm including a closer photo of the tip of this thing.




There were also the muskets that the conquistadores used. Those things had a slow burning fuse that had to be lit with every shot. I wonder how fast you could get off a couple of shots?