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November 8th, 2009
 | 10:35 am - Garrison Keillor: Rebel
Just heard yesterday's Prairie Home Companion, which was a road show from the Iowa State Fair. In the Lives of the Cowboys segment he put in a word on the evils of corn. In Iowa. Cool! And he kept the audience with him. No boos. Genius!
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November 6th, 2009
| 08:54 pm - Is this the party to whom I am speaking?
Danger! Techie-speak!
I just got a new smartphone this week, as I found a deal that didn't completely gum up the cash flow. It runs Android, and I plan to write apps for it as soon as I dust off my non-existent Java skills and install the tools - and decide what to write. I'm having fun playing with the GPS.
I am cobbling up a web page to connect to my PayPal account so I can take plastic at TusCon if the need arises. That will be able to run anywhere. Chris and I are selling buttons and filk, or maybe filk and buttons. Phase I of that is done: I have a painfully-slow site running on my laptop using the PayPal default buttons and shopping cart. Phase 2 will use my shopping cart, and send the aggregated info to PayPal. Hopefully this will run faster.
I've also been working on a website that will reside on a flash drive. It's for locating people after a big emergency. I helped out doing that during Katrina - donated some web space and did some data entry. I thought this would be a good beginners' project to use the mad Erlang skillz I have been picking up the last year or so. Thus: an Erlang environment, YAWS web server, and the PeopleFinder web site, all running on Windows for the moment, as that is what I have available. Plug the flash drive in, answer two or three set-up questions, and you are instantly set up for data entry wherever you are. Add a web connection and data can be exchanged. At the moment the web site is maybe 25% done (if that much). Basic database function is in place, the site can detect if it's been initialized, and data entry screen works. It isn't running off the thumb drive yet, as I need to pick up a thumb drive and install a clean set of tools on it.
Also, I'll be learning a touch of Java at work: there are two of us on the Build and Install team - one guy doing Java/PowerBuilder front end, and me doing Oracle back end stuff. Found out yesterday we are supposed to cross-train so we can cover for each other.
What fun.
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October 31st, 2009
| 04:47 pm - Redbelly the Pyrate says...
You kids stay outta my yarrrd!
Here, have some harrrrdtack fer tricks an' treats!
Do you have a guarrrrdian with ye?
Don't mind me guarrrrd dog.
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October 25th, 2009
| 10:27 pm - Electras and Electro-scams!
Went to see the bio-pic "Amelia" today.
However, the interesting action was in the next booth over at the place we had supper after the movie. An ill-dressed loudmouth slob was attempting to raise a quarter-million dollars for a very poorly defined solar plant.
Very poorly defined, indeed: the solar plant was supposed use a patented process. The prospective investor asked a question, and loudmouth stated "it's patent pending; I'll revise the web site". He described 4,000 megawatts of output from a solar plant a hundred feet square. Or was it 4,000 kilowatts? No, he repeated himself: 4,000 megawatts.
And let's not forget the fund-raising: he's seeking "donations" on his web site, so as not to get into trouble with the IRS. No mention of the Securities and Exchange Commission.
At this point, my wife got up to refill her beverage, maneuvered around to where the mark, er potential investor (donor?) could see her, but Loudmouth could not. She pointed at Loudmouth and made the universal sign for "crazy". Potential investor acknowledged her with a tiny nod.
Loudmouth couldn't remember the names of the local utilities, and he couldn't pronounce "photovoltaic". I had trouble stifling my laughter. Then the real corker: he's still at the "idea" phase of the project, so he's going to hire engineers and leave the work to them. He's no engineer, after all. But! But! he now mentioned the specific make and model of generator he was going to use. Isn't specifying the generator the engineers' job?
Now the hard sell began. Again an admission of how he is skirting Federal law by soliciting funds on a public website: "I can't ask for investors so I'm askin' for donations". He told the potential investor "you really gotta call tomorrow". Investor got up and left, giving my wife a little nod as he passed. Loudmouth followed him out to the parking lot. The show was over.
I was going to ask Loudmouth for his business card - I had a little bet with myself that Loudmouth in fact had no business cards. But he was gone by the time we left.
You can't pay for a floor show like that.
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September 3rd, 2009
| 10:29 pm - Tweet! said the great ape.
I don't wanna jinx it or anything, but I started drawing Monkey Servants again tonight in my nice clean office. Playing with my nice new technical pens I got from Patrick Kerr in Pike Place Market.
Also, I am now on Twitter. Over there I am monkeyservant because Chatworthy was already taken.
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April 9th, 2009
| 08:19 pm - Make em Laugh
So after an Arthur Dent Thursday - "It must be Thursday. I never could get the hang of Thursday." - which began with cardiology (I traded up from Doogie Howser to Doc Cottle, and they scheduled me for a stress test next week) then progressed to much error-prone kookiness at work.
So at Wildflower, waiting for dinner to take out, I was tinkering with iced tea, putting sweetening chemicals in and stirring (not shaking). A little kid, maybe a year old is in a high chair at the next table. Dad is feeding him dinner and all is well. He hears paper tearing behind him and turns around and sees me playing with my drink. He's fascinated. I make a funny face or two. Kid is happy. My food arrives. I'm happy.
Now I'm at home and the Mythbusters have just taken out a compact car at 650 MPH. I'm happy.
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April 8th, 2009
| 07:32 pm - The Big Doubleya.
As in the McGuffin from "It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World". Or last night's Sun Dragon Scriptorum.
Knew a few folks there from archery, none of them knew I did calligraphy.
Took copious notes; I'll be obtaining some supplies this weekend. Then I was shown some samples, including a few uncolored/unlettered blank scrolls with some nifty initial letters, some of which were big W's - a lot of the standard scroll texts begin with the phrase "Whereas it has come to Our notice...". So I pencilled in a big Uncial W and wove some knotwork into it, which took much of the evening. Great fun.
Tonight I brought some work home, so I can avoid cramming 8 hours work into 6 tomorrow, working around a doctors appointment. Fortunately, the nature of this work is: start process, wait a couple hours for the process to finish; put everything back the way I found it.
Still to do this week: Chris' taxes, and repair a bunch of arrows.
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April 7th, 2009
| 06:38 pm - Calligramatography!
I'm gearing up to take the button and calligraphed stuff business on the road this summer, and I'm also more into the SCA than I have been in a while, so I'm going to Scriptorium tonight to find out how much better than my usual standards are those of Sun Dragon and Atenveldt. And to pitch in on some scrolls.
And I can use the practice.
Last night I translated the Holy Hand Grenade instructions into bad Latin, which will be calligraphed suitable for framing.
I've got half a booth at the Robin Hood Festival in Sherwood, Oregon in July. And I'll be doing custom pieces between now and then and putting them up on Etsy.
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March 16th, 2009
| 09:20 pm - Ex-Brother Patrick and his Inevitable Portable Scriptorium
We're committed to doing Greyhound Guild at Ren Fair during March. So I was out there the first weekend of March, missed this past weekend, as I was required by the day job to babysit and intimidate databases, and will be there the next two weekends.
Chris suggested that I take some calligraphy stuff out and demonstrate calligraphy while away from Greyhound Guild. I've been thinking about having a calligraphy booth or cart or some such out there anyway - I could make dozens of dollars - if I can persuade the day job that I Must Have All Of My Weekends In Feb and March. Which hasn't happened yet.
So I contacted fair and have received permission to demonstrate calligraphy in character, but not to sell anything (which I'm not planning to do). So, the next two Saturdays, if you're at AZ Ren Fair and you see this fellow out on the streets with a lap desk and quill pens, loudly denouncing the printing press as a really bad idea, stop by and say hi. I might even make you a bookmark.
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February 10th, 2009
| 05:47 pm - My Summer Vacation
It's summer where I was a year ago at this time. And I'm on vacation.
I just drew and posted a new MonkeyServants. First one since my August meltdown brought me into survival mode. I'm goin' plumb psycho (short trip) tryin' to figure out how to post the link to it on Facebook, and actually get it seen over there.
And I got eight tracks mixed to stereo on the CD project I'm assisting with.
Tomorrow: archery.
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February 3rd, 2009
| 08:28 pm - It's been a quiet week on Lake Washington...
... then the filkers showed up at Conflikt and demonstrated what could be done with diatomaceous broccoli melons and a black hole. With a flying visit to Spokane for good measure.
But I get ahead of myself. ( Licky diatomaceous melons! Right this way! )
In summary, the cart would've helped us get to more of the con, but a good time was had by both of us.
And that's the news from Lake Washington.
Current Music: S. McGuire and students: The Black Death
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January 24th, 2009
| 10:26 pm - American efficiency is...
...when one's first pair of bifocals and one's first AARP card arrive within 24 hours. I'm not sending AARP the ten bucks just yet because they misspelled my name, and I only just turned 48. I think they're trying to ease me into the AARP thing; maybe I can ease them into spelling my name right. There's time.
Oh, and my car hit 99,000 miles just half an hour ago. But I'm pretty sure that was mere coincidence.
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| 12:44 pm - My own Galactica theory
Everybody dies, then the lifeless, drifting hulks of the fleet are run over by the Red Dwarf.
Just saying.
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January 23rd, 2009
| 08:26 pm - ..or I could work
Been busy at work, and have shifted my hours to accommodate the workflow, but I have some breaks coming up: jury duty, Conflikt and I took the week leading up to President's Day off so as to go to Estrella War and loose some arrows in the general direction of targets. Or if I get too rambunctious, the National Guard range over the hill. (With a 30 pound bow? Not!)
At least, that's the current theory.
Meanwhile: Over at Villagers, I am in awe.
And I've got a Facebook account now, though I'm still not sure what to do with it.
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January 9th, 2009
| 07:00 pm - We get a Diana!
For those of you who know her, Diana Challis is in town and dropping by our place for a visit Sunday afternoon, three-ish. All are welcome; drop me a line for directions.
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January 7th, 2009
| 06:31 am - Writer's Block: Doctor Who?
Do I have to be in charge of casting? I'd like to play the Doctor!
Of course, I am American and 48, whilst Davies and Company are going younger and younger for the role.
So keeping the younger theme going, let's cast Rupert Grint, once Harry Potter has ended. He's got the right energy.
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January 3rd, 2009
| 08:16 pm - Armor up!
Well, I'm NOT doing ren fair this year - right before the holidays I had a bit o' burnout and had pretty much decided not to do festival. But I gave myself the holidays to be sure. This past week at work confirmed it; I'm gonna be working at least two weekends during Festival and I had already committed to seven of the eight weekends. So festival was falling apart for me, though we'll pick a weekend and attend.
So I made plans to -finally- organize the garage, renewed my SCA membership (and bought one for ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) harmonyheifer - she wants to go to Estrella one day and shop) and started back to archery. And tacnuke dropped hints about my coming out for siege again. Last Sunday at archery we were discussing plans for Estrella War, and I mentioned I'm doing target archery and would enjoy doing siege, but I'm not currently authorized. A little bird mentioned to me that if all I'm doing is siege, I can probably get in on a siege crew without authorization, as the weapon and crew authorize as a unit. Even if that's not actually so, it provided an impetus to patch up the armor.
I'm in a weird place: I've been in the SCA off and on (mainly off) since I moved to AZ in the spring of '82. I know how to fight, have been in several wars, but have fallen through the cracks and -never- been formally authorized as a fighter. Atenveldt didn't have formal authorization when I was active, and when I was authorized in the past I was grandfathered in by a marshal friend of mine. That has expired.
The upshot of this is I have a bunch of armor in various states of repair out in the garage. So my hobby the past week has been restrapping the war armor and finally making the coat part of the coat of plates. Great fun - I really enjoy working on armor. I'm not 100% done, but with a little duct tape I could take the field tomorrow, maybe even Finally Get Authorized.
However:
Weather forecast for tomorrow:
Sunday: A 50 percent chance of showers. Mostly cloudy, with a high near 57. South southeast wind 5 to 11 mph becoming north. Winds could gust as high as 23 mph.
Not great archery weather, nor the best for war praactice either. I'll go to the Gauntlet Tourney - archery - but I think I might be home with a good book and more coat-of-plates sewing most of the day.
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December 28th, 2008
| 08:10 pm - Light rail, arrows, no slings
Yesterday was the grand opening of the light rail in Phoenix. Liking trains as I do, I of course showed up for the first rides. Very crowded (90,000 people rode yesterday) but fairly smooth running. A good stress test of the system. It'll be good for going to Tempe for the arts festival and Westercon. Less good for plays at Tempe Little Theater since they have moved over to the new arts center over on Rio Salado, which may or may not be a reasonable walk/scoot from the light rail. I was in line in front of three ladies travelling together, one in a wheelchair, and there was no problem at all boarding and getting her chair into position, so we'll be able to take the scooter places. Maybe we'll take the train to the Star Trek exhibit at the Science Center.
Went to archery today and came oh so close to getting a "spider", which is our local nickname for the X at the exact center of the target. If you hit two legs of the X, you get minor bragging rights and a little badge. Have decided I'm not performing at Ren Fair, so that frees up time and energy to go to Estrella War instead, where I'll be shooting archery. I'm pulling my armor together, as tacnuke is gently reminding me ("Pat that's GREAT! Get your armor together!!!!") that I could go be on his siege engine crew. Spent a bit of time this afternoon trying armor on and determining what needs to be repaired. Also took inventory so when I go to Tandy's later this week I don't buy any more fasteners: I have plenty of copper rivets.
I like being on siege crew almost as much as I like building the armor. So that'll be fun even if all I do at war is target archery.
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December 23rd, 2008
| 07:07 pm - Understanding Nerds at Yuletide
eli_the_insane sent me a nice set of USB holiday lights! I put them on immediately:
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December 20th, 2008
| 09:02 pm - I guess it was a you-name-it deficiency
I had no energy at all the beginning of the week, was a complete poophead Wednesday and Thursday, and pulled out of it yesterday and today.
Tuesday night after my guitar final I was walking back to the car when I pulled my keys out of my pocket and heard something fall to the walkway. Looked around and didn't see anything but it appears that was the moment when I dropped my money clip. Lost a few bucks but unfortunately I had put my drivers license in there last Saturday when I went out for a ren fair promo.
I finally missed the money clip Wednesday morning, retraced my steps but campus police hadn't received it. Almost immediately replaced my drivers license which now has a much better photo as a result. But that ate my energy for Wednesday and the rest of the day and ren fair workshops were a bust.
Decided maybe I don't wanna perform at renfair after all, considering they aren't paying me, I'm unwilling and mostly unable to tent-camp anymore, and hotels are at their most expensive during festival. We have reservations at the place we stayed last season for every Festival weekend, but I don't want to spend the money. I could commute - have done it before - but that's a ton of driving. Ren Fair commutes are a major reason my car has 97,000 miles on it already, and won't be paid off till July.
This and a complete lack of anything sensible in my bloodstream (vitamins, minerals, blood, etc) led to me being not very fun to be with Thursday.
Friday I got back onto my routine and am doing much better. Came across a couple articles for a possible long-term project that if it works would make doing Ren Fairs cheaper and possibly easier. At the cost of some work. Details later; I'm still collating data and trying to talk myself out of this. But for this year, I'm still really close to dropping ren fair. And it's now too late to commit to Estrella War on the level I'd like to (armor up, authorize, do combat archery and trebuchet crew). I could shift my time off around and go out and shoot target archery, though I am much out of practice and need a dozen new arrows, quick! And authorization, come to think of it - Atenveldt formalized archery authorizations recently.
So this will be the season I get the garage organized. And I'll go to the March folk festival in Glendale that's replacing Encanto.
That's the down side of the week. On the up side, we have our plane tickets for Conflikt! We already had memberships and hotel reservations. I just dropped Seanan a line and asked if I could pick up my pre-ordered copy of Red Roses and Dead Things at Conflikt. By the way, pre-orders are still available and this CD, based on the songs I already know, is gonna kick some zombie butt.
Today I nipped into Fry's and picked up a FireWire card so I can use my Digi 002 Pro Tools console on my media machine. The Pro Tools 8 upgrade is out and affordable. And I want to do some recording. When I bought the computer 4 years ago, FireWire and upgraded memory were out of my price range; today I ordered the memory and got the FireWire card for around $50 total.
Installing the FireWire card probably saved the computer from melting down - there was a ton of dust in the cooling fan intakes. All cleaned up now and I'll vacuum it out again when the memory upgrade arrives in a few days. The console is hooked up and working, but I need to thoroughly review the instructions. It's been a while since I ripped that cassette (Riders In The Sky's "Cowboys In Love") to CD.
Played a bit of guitar today; just noodling about. Accidentally played the first few notes of "The Sound of Music" and plowed through to the end with minimal problems. Chris thought it sounded okay. I haven't played that song in probably 30 years, and that would have been on the piano. I think I'm gonna take the Thursday class in the spring. If there's an evening welding class at GCC that could be tempting as well. The Mythbusters make it look easy and I have about the same level of ADD as Adam Savage appears to. Must see.
I've also been reading John Scalzi's "Old Man's War" and the sequels. Great fun.
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