July 2006 Archives

I was "watching" yesterday's Tigers game against the Twins via MLB's online game stats service (the modern version of the sports ticker). Pitcher Jeremy Bronderman was almost perfect through 7 innings and the Tigers were rolling to a 4-0 win and a series sweep in the Metrodome. I clicked the window closed as the game entered the bottom of the eighth (Ray had woken up from his nap). Later on, I summoned the result to my cell phone via SMS and was stunned when my tiny screen read "Minnesota: 6; Detroit 4." What the hell had happened?!?!

If you take a quick gander at the left-hand column you'll see that I've expanded the list of blogs I link to. This listing is commonly known as a "Blogroll" and is implemented via Arvind Satyanarayan's excellent Movable Type plug-in, MT Blogroll.

On the heels of my earlier post about inaccurate computer error messages, here's a rant about deliberately misleading ones.

Upon trying to pay bills via Washington Mutual's web site today:

Portions of our Web site are temporarily unavailable due to regularly scheduled maintenance.

In 2010, the sequel to the sublime 2001: A Space Odyssey, the motive behind the HAL 9000 computer's killing spree in the first movie is revealed. The computer, it seems, was given conflicting orders and was just doing its best to reconcile them. HAL's programmer, Dr. Chandra, explains: "Computers don't know how to lie."

Lucky for us, most computers won't try to kill us if they experience an "unhandled exception." They either pop up an error message or they crash.

People don't generally realize this, but there's no law that computer error messages have to have anything to do with the error that's currently happening. In IT work, knowing this often leads you down unexpected paths toward solutions.

If you look at the timestamp on my blog posts, you'll note that I use a 24-hour time format. This is consistent with the way that my blog software, Movable Type, requires that I enter the time on "scheduled" posts. I have sometimes been tripped up by that and entered a time of "04:30:00" intending the post to go out sometime in the afternoon, only to later realize that it went out immediately and appeared as if I had posted it earlier in the day at 4 am.

The other day, my confusion over am/pm resulted in a moment of panic followed by brief public embarrassment.

The recent discussion about the 9/11 conspiracy theories got me thinking about my experience in college with Oliver Stone's JFK. This is especially timely as Mr. Stone is all set to drop another cinematic hodge-podge onto the silver screen with his World Trade Center.

I spent a semester doing an independent research project on JFK, which was still in the theaters at the time (which meant I had to shell out $5 every time I needed to go back to see it). My paper didn't take on the veracity of the numerous (often contradictory) conspiracy theories suggested by the movie, but my roommate Karl and I, as a side hobby, read everything we could get our hands on regarding the Kennedy assassination (our conclusion: Oswald did it and acted alone).

It was really my first exposure to the intoxicating sport of conspiracism.

I'm not sure when I became the World's Best Driver. There wasn't a ceremony; I received no certificate or badge. But in the opinion of everyone who matters on this issue (i.e. me), there is no one on the planet who drives better than I do.

So, imagine my chagrin when a driving-related annoyance that I've been cursing others for doing for years now turns out to be perfectly permissible. And I didn't know it.

In Moneyball, Oakland A's General Manager Billy Beane reported that he doesn't like recruiting high school pitchers. In a chat session with readers of Baseball Prospectus, he explains:

We also try and minimize economic and health risk by drafting college pitchers. We also feel that because they are older and more experienced, college pitchers have a tendency to give you better early results when they enter the Major Leagues.

The good news is, I found the perfect summer camp for Ray to attend when he gets older.

Camp Quest is the first residential summer camp in the history of the United States for the children of Atheists, Freethinkers, Humanists, Brights, or whatever other terms might be applied to those who hold to a naturalistic, not supernatural world view.

Wait, strike that! They also have one just north of Sacramento around Nevada City!

Summer at atheist camp for Ray; summer for me and Amy at nearby Lake Tahoe.... This sounds like a plan!

This is some seriously fucked up stuff. From Harper's (also via boingboing): "It turns out there's an upside to the current conflict between Israel and Hezbollah -- if you're waiting for the second coming of Christ. Here's a selection of excited messages spotted over the last few days on the Rapture Ready/End Times Chat online bulletin board."

Praise God! We are chosen to be in these times and also watch and spread the word. Something inside me is exploding to get out, and I don't know what it is. Its kind of like I want to do cartwheels around the neighborhood.

I too am soooo excited!! I get goose bumps, literally, when I watch what's going on in the M.E.!! And Watcherboy, you were so right when saying it was quite a day yesterday, in the world news, and I add in local news here in the Boston area!! Tunnel ceiling collapsed on a car and killed a woman of faith, and we had the most terrifying storms I have ever seen here!! But, yes, oh happy day, like in your screen name , it is most indeed a time to be happy and excited, right there with ya!!

This is the busiest I've ever seen this website in a few years! I have been having rapture dreams and I can't believe that this is really it! We are on the edge of eternity!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Got that dancing feeling on the inside of me.

As I am licking the last charred drops of sweet, sweet coffee from the bottom of my carafe, I came across this (via boingboing): the Death by Caffeine Calculator. Find out how many cups of coffee it would take to kill you (or someone of your equivalent body weight). Luckily for me, it would take approximately 95 more cups than I drink daily.

Of course, it doesn't say it's "per day," but I think I've had more than 101 cups in my lifetime and I'm still kicking.

Edgy, shaking, and alert ... but kicking.

A North Carolina law that states, in part: "If any man and woman, not being married to each other, shall lewdly and lasciviously associate, bed and cohabit together, they shall be guilty of a Class 2 misdemeanor" was declared unconstitutional by a state judge today.

Phew. Now Amy and I can finally move to Raleigh and associate lewdly and lasciviously there. We've been waiting all this time....

We are, however, still not welcome in Blackjack, MO.

Amy's been on me for years to invent something insanely useful and profitable so we can live off the royalties and not have to work. She simply can't understand why it's taking me so long.

To my credit, I have come up with lots of good ideas only to find out they've already been invented, like transparent propane tanks, a water faucet with programmable pre-sets, a way for radio stations to transmit the title and artist of the current song for display on a special FM receiver, and the Internet.

It's surprisingly hard to think of something wholly new. There's an old, disproved canard about Charles H. Duell, a Patent Office official who recommended that the Patent Office be closed because he thought that everything that could possibly be invented had already been invented. But I tend to think that idea may not be so far-fetched.

For inspiration, I frequently check out The Half-Bakery, "a communal database of original, fictitious inventions, edited by its users." Some of the ideas aren't so bad -- "the Panic PIN" -- whereas others (OK, most) are just plain silly -- the evil-laugh activated hand-dryer.

I think that given a computer, some motion sensors, a bunch of cable, and a few Raymond Chandler novels, I could definitely come up with the Film Noir Home. One or two big installations of that, and Amy and I could be kickin' back at our villa in Umbria by the time we're 40.

I had to take Tobiko, our old gray-and-white cat, to his Final Vet Appointment on Monday. In life, Tobiko was a difficult cat to get close to. Unlike our beloved Tim (who met the same fate last year), Tobiko was standoffish, moody, and rather dim. Many of our friends never met him. At times, he could be affectionate (when he wasn't trying to kill you) and he had been with Amy for 15 years. It was a difficult decision, but he was hyperthyroid, his quality-of-life was low, and he just seemed pretty through with it all.

We felt it was only right to explain the situation to Ray rather than wait for him to inquire about Tobiko's absence. There was a decent chance he never would notice, but we felt it was important to be up-front and honest.

I didn't realize just how damn difficult it is to explain the concept of death to someone who doesn't really even understand what "life" is. I sort of understand now why some people resort to fanciful explanations involving "heaven" and "god," or tell their kids that "Penny went to go live on a farm," or something.

We had previously determined that it would be in our best interests to avoid (a) linking the idea of death with going to the doctor, (b) linking death with being sick, and (c) using the term "being put to sleep." With sleep already being a Huge Issue, that's the last thing we need. "C'mon Ray. Time to go to sleep!"

So we had to stutter and stammer about like idiots informing Ray that "Tobiko had a sickness that wasn't going to get better, and he was very, very old, and ... well, Tobiko died." Ray patiently sat between us and asked the perfectly appropriate question: "What's 'died'?"

How do you answer that? We tried to connect the concept to bodily functions Ray already knows about, like breathing. Also, he has seen and commented on dead bugs and slugs and plants. We pulled from all those concepts and tried to convey the idea of an animal who no longer breathed, moved, ate, or slept. When Ray asked "Where he is?" we relied on the fact that he knows how food in the kitchen waste container goes bad and decays, and we stumbled through a rather gruesome (in retrospect) tale of of how dead animal bodies were like food waste that can go bad, and Tobiko's body was taken by the Kitty Doctor who would properly dispose of him.

In the end, Ray seemed satisfied (or bored) with it, and declared that he wanted to resume playing.

Goodbye, 'biko. Rest in peace.

My conservative uncle sent me an article from right-wing nutcase David Horowitz's site, Front Page Magazine, the other day. The article reports on my former employer, the University of Wisconsin-Madison, which has hired a controversial
lecturer to teach a course in Islamic religion and culture. The lecturer has publicly claimed that the 9/11 attacks were part of a U.S. government conspiracy to justify the invasion of Iraq. The issue has sparked a minor outrage and has prompted Republican lawmakers to call for his termination.

An editorial on the site claims to be agnostic about the political content of the lecturer's opinion and instead attempts to frame the issue as one of a failure of responsible "academic freedom."

True academic freedom also requires Barrett's colleagues to examine and challenge the points of his theories. Nobody is doing that.... Academic freedom requires action. Academic freedom requires educators to challenge preposterous theories.

Theories of astronomy and physics (not to mention economics) may be challenged by anyone, including by teachers, but opponents of ID have turned Darwinism from a theory into a theology, where no holes and contradictions in the theory can be constitutionally debated in a classroom.

The original article further states:

By planning to insert his personal view that 9/11 was caused by a government conspiracy into a course on the "religion and culture" of Islam, Barrett makes a mockery of these academic principles. His view is unscholarly, unstudied, and unsubstantiated and to include it in an academic course is an outrage and embarrassment for his university, tantamount to including a segment on Holocaust denial in a course on Jewish culture or a discussion of why the earth might be flat in a geology course.

Give it up, FrontPagers. You're pissed because the UW lecturer said bad things about Bush and not about the university's handling of "academic freedom." You're calling for political censorship, pure and simple.

I've had friends who refused to go to movies with me because of my film studies pedigree . "You'll over analyze it, and it's just supposed to be fun and entertaining," they'd whine.

Given that two of my favorite movies are Zorro: The Gay Blade and Die Hard, I explain to them that I know from entertainment, and that I can and do appreciate lightweight cinematic fare for its own virtues.

To me, it doesn't matter if a movie is black-and-white or color, in French or English, made before 1950 or after 1950, or directed by an auteur or not. It's got to be well-written, the characters need proper motivation, and above all it has to surprise me. I can forgive a fair amount of technical clumsiness and awkward acting as long as the script and the direction are solid, original, and smart.

Sadly, the new Superman movie -- Superman Returns -- largely fails on those counts.

Hearing about someone else's dream has got to be the most boring thing ever. I've already wasted Major Readers' time recounting my loose tooth dreams. At the risk of turning everyone away for good, here's another one.

I dream so rarely that these recurring ones sort of freak me out. I am highly skeptical of generalized dream analysis based on any sort of archetypes, but I figure that, for me, these must be significant.

So, I'm back in college, taking classes and, apparently, working at the same time. The semester is nearly over, and it occurs to me that I've completely forgotten to attend any classes or do the work, and the date for dropping courses without penalty has long passed. In a nutshell, I'm screwed.

I am greatly troubled by this. I know that I often rely on things "just working out" since, for me, they nearly always do. But I think I'm sort of unconsciously waiting for the other show to drop. I mean, I've been pretty fortunate/lucky throughout my life in work, health, finances, family, relationships (with a notable exception), and now as a parent (see "My Smart Kid"). A part of me is lurking somewhere, deeply embedded in my brain, wondering "Just when is life going to catch up with me?"

When am I going to face a real no-win situation?

When will the deadline just not be extended for me no matter how hard I plead?

When will I finally be revealed for the fraud that I must suspect I truly am?

Of course, it could just be all that cheese I ate yesterday.

I got an email today from a film professor in Greece wanting to cite my ancient grad school paper on Surrealist cinema, which I wrote about a few weeks ago in the context of the mis/over-use of the term "surreal."

How cool is that?!

I lived in Madison, Wisconsin, when the satirical newspaper The Onion was published there (the sell-outs have since moved to New York). You could get it in virtually every coffee shop, and I anxiously awaited every Wednesday to read another collection of hilarity.

One day, I was in the Dean's office and a new visiting scholar from somewhere East Asia came in. He was carrying the regular "real news" weekly paper as well as a copy of The Onion. While he was waiting for the Dean, he leafed through The Onion and became quite alarmed at some apocalyptic story in that issue. He shared it with the Dean's secretary and me, and we could barely contain our laughter as we informed him it was a joke. He didn't speak English all that well, and we weren't sure that he understood even after we explained it to him.

Similarly, but far more publicly, Christian anti-abortion blogger and apparent nutjob "Pete" at "March Together for Life" recently posted a diatribe against an essay in The Onion by "Caroline Weber" entitled "I'm Totally Psyched About This Abortion!" But "Pete" apparently didn't get that it was a joke and that "Caroline Weber" doesn't exist.

After enduring over 200 comments informing him that he was an idiot, he posted a follow-up in which he mostly justifies his stance, sites examples of other people he knows who feel the same as "Ms. Weber," and still doesn't quite seem to understand that the essay was made up.

At least the Asian guy in Madison had a language barrier as his excuse.

boingboing links to this story in the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel about a cloud of mayflies in La Crosse, Wisconsin, so thick that it showed up on National Weather Service radar.

I drove through just such a cloud in La Crosse a few years ago around this time of the season. It was one of the freakiest things I've experienced.

The mayflies hatch along the banks of the Mississippi River, and Highway 14 runs right alongside it. The Journal reports that the flies "leave the water, and mate in a sudden burst of aerial theatrics before dying."

At first, it was just a few amorous insects smacking the windshield. Pretty soon, the windshield was covered with mayfly goo. Then we hit the full swarm. Visibility was near zero and the crackling sound of the flies smacking the car was deafening. The windshield wipers were useless against the piling fly carcasses.

Just as I was about to give up and pull over, the swarm subsided. I directed the car into a service station and, along with a dozen other motorists, began the disgusting process of scraping the fly bodies off the windows and headlights. There was about a half-inch of build-up all over the car.

When we finally got to where we were going, I was advised to hose the car off as much as possible right then -- at 11:00 pm -- so that the fly paste wouldn't bake onto the car in the sun the next day. The fly corpses were in every crevasse and cranny of the car, including under the hood. It took about an hour of spraying and scraping to get most of the rest off.

From today's Seattle Times: "20 people evacuated after propane leak"

Ouch, that's gotta hurt.

For the record, "to evacuate" means "to empty or remove the contents of; or to create a vacuum in."

You can evacuate people from an area (and the article's lead paragraph gets that right). If you simply evacuate people ... well, that you've got a real mess on your hands.

I asked someone recently if she liked baseball. She said she'd been to a game once but found it really boring. Her friends assured her, however, that it was an exception and that games are usually more exciting.

I told her they were wrong.

Amy and I watched Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas the other night as part of our (read: her) Johnny Depp Film Festival. Luckily for me, this was one of the movies in which Johnny, playing "Raoul Duke" (really Hunter S. Thompson), isn't all that attractive or appealing. I don't know how I'm ever going to measure up after we watch Chocolat in a few weeks.

Anyway, Johnny/Hunter and his friend/attorney Dr. Gonzo (Benicio Del Toro) spend the entire film strung out on any number of illicit substances they carry with them in a suitcase -- mescaline, ether, cocaine, acid, and good old-fashioned tequila. Not a moment is spent sober and no one gets any sleep. They rampage through Las Vegas in a drug-addled stupor and leave destruction is their wake.

I can't say I enjoyed the movie. I tend to like Terry Gilliam as a director, and the film is visually stunning. Johnny Depp is, as usual (with the exception of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory) excellent. I think the subject matter just got to me. I really can't relate to the degree of self-destruction and loss of personal control that the characters experience.

I want to stringently avoid being the kind of parent who brags about his kid. No one really wants to hear it, and it's probably not good for the kid.

But Ray can't read yet, and I just can't help myself!

The results of Ray's language tests have come back.

He's in the 99th percentile for both "expressive" and "receptive" language skills. I'm so proud.

On the other hand, he's in the 9th percentile for articulation.

As my mom will undoubtedly comment, I was totally incomprehensible until I was four. (Cue "Don't you mean 'up to and including when you were 36?' jokes. Ha-ha-ha.)

Thus endeth parental bragging. Back to my regularly scheduled self-indulgent blogging.

Against my better judgment and sense of antiestablishmentarianism, I signed up for a MySpace account a few months ago. Some competetitor on some reality TV show that shall remain nameless was rumored to have a MySpace "space," and I thought one needed an account to view it. What do I know about the kids these days and their rock-n-roll music, hula hoops, and social networking sites?

My forgotten account lay dormant until the other day when my Bus Friend, Molly, mentioned she had one and was keeping a blog on the site (which is highly amusing, but is for "Friends Only").

As I was poking around MySpace and trying to figure out what all the hype was about, the whole thing really began to annoy the hell out me.

Today's my little sister's birthday. She was born on 7/7/73 at 7:37 am. And, yes, she is incredibly lucky. She won the lottery on her 18th birthday.

I considered getting her one of these, but instead sent her a gift card. I'm so mundane.

Anyway, happy birthday, sis! I love you.

Today begins a three-day weekend series between my beloved Detroit Tigers and my new hometown team the Seattle Mariners. Ah, the conflict of loyalties....

And I've got my ticket for Saturday's game!

We went to a Tigers-Mariners game a couple years ago, and I found myself falling right back in to root for the Tigers. This year, I'm ramping it up a bit and will actually don my Tigers' cap. I think I'll avoid the face paint and stuffed tiger tail this time.

Unfortunately, Amy and Ray won't be joining me. Ray's asleep by 7:00, which rules out evening games. Even with a babysitter, it's difficult for us to get to anything before 7:30 or 8:00. Sunday's game is at 1:00, which just happens to be during his naptime (when he takes a nap, that is).

This will be my first game of the year, and I'm looking forward to a nice, traditional evening of baseball with a cup of organic microbrew beer in one hand and fresh sushi in the other!

Go Tigers!

Musing yesterday about my nom de plume got me reminiscing about an occurrence when I lived in Iowa City.

Assume for the purposes of this tale that my name really is "Major Steel."

I got home one Sunday afternoon and checked my voice mail. The only message was from a woman who did not identify herself and whose voice I didn't recognize. She was crying, and after a few moments said only: "Major, I love you," before hanging up.

This was in the dark days before Caller ID or *69, so I had no way of telling who this could be. I didn't have a girlfriend at the time, though I was dating a couple different women. And some broken-hearted ex's were still around someplace. I compiled a list of suspects in my head and decided to make some calls. Someone was upset and needed help!

I've used the moniker "majorsteel" now for nearly a decade for purposes both mundane and nefarious.

OK, maybe not so nefarious.

I typically used it for computer accounts where its lower-case and space-less qualities made sense. Now that I have imposed full pseudonymity upon this blog, I've been using it more and more in contexts where I need separate first and last names.

So, am I "majorsteel" or "Major Steel"? Is "Major" my title? If so, what's my first name? What am I a Major of, anyway?

It turns out there was a real "Major Steel" -- Major P. C. Steel, a British officer who fought during WWII (or "the Big One," as we like to call it). He is pictured at right, and you can read about his company's experience on D-Day at WarChronicle.com. Sadly, Major Steel didn't make it, but he was remembered fondly:

The battalion suffered a great loss in Major Steel, who was killed by a machine-gun bullet while up with his forward platoons in Lebisey. He was not only a very good officer, greatly respected by the men, but of more than normal intelligence and culture and a fine swimmer, runner and golfer.

A "Major Steel" also makes an appearance in the UK comic series "Lion." He's not listed as a major [sic] character anywhere, but a site called 26pigs.com has a reference to him.

I would dearly love to own the majorsteel.com domain once and for all. But someone -- Jerry Zodin of Bellaire, Texas, to be precise -- registered it before me.

There's no web presence at majorsteel.com. Mr. Zodin -- who, according to a Google search, is (or was) in the steel business -- doesn't use it for his email address (which is broken). It's a dormant domain, locked by its registrar, and off limits to me, the one, true, Major Steel.

Or majorsteel. Whatever.

Tom Waits, my favorite singer-songwriter and probably the coolest man ever, just announced he's touring the Midwest and southern states later this summer.

"We need to go to Tennessee to pick up some fireworks, and someone owes me money in Kentucky," said his press release.

He did a limited tour in the northwest last year and I got to see him at the Paramount here in Seattle. For friends and family of mine back in Detroit, he's going to be there on August 11th at the Opera House. Go see him!

Here's "Chocolate Jesus."

Another July 4th recollection....

The fireworks display in LaCrosse, Wisconsin, was supposed to be remarkable. In my mind, nothing could beat the display from Hoover Days in West Branch, Iowa (seriously), but there was a lot of buzz about the LaCrosse festivities and the fact that the show would start with three skydivers shooting fireworks as they parachuted from a plane. That sounded cool.

We spread our blanket on the shores of the Mississippi and waited. Shortly after nightfall, someone near us pointed up in the sky and said "There they are!" After a few moments, my eyes located a small red light in the sky, and then another. I could just make out the shape of the parachutes in the light created by the fireworks the skydivers shot off as they descended to earth.

The crowd ooooooo'd and ahhhhh'd as the band struck up a tune. After a little while, I remarked: "Weren't there supposed to be three skydivers?"

The next day, we learned what happened to the third one. It involved a failed chute and the roof of a hardware store on the other side of the river.

Ouch.

My sister and I were never allowed to have firecrackers when we were kids. By the time I grew up and could drive myself to the scary-looking metal buildings just off the interstate and buy some, I didn't have much interest in doing so. Consequently, to this day I have never lit a bottle rocket, ignited an M-80, or set off a three-inch mortar or whatever the hell those motherfuckers down the street were setting off until eleven-fucking-o'clock last night. Damn kids. And I wish they'd stay off my lawn.

We were, however, permitted to have sparklers. Now, there's a great idea. "No, kids, you may not light off a contained small explosive device that's designed to shoot off far away from you, but, here, hold these burning pieces of white-hot magnesium in your hands and run around in the dark waving them randomly as they shower you and your cousins with sparks. Have fun!" Yeah, that's much safer than a Roman candle.

As youngsters, it didn't take us long to grow somewhat dissatisfied with sparklers. Desperate for some greater holiday action one year, my eyes fell upon the warning label on the sparkler box.

"WARNING: Do not light more than one sparkler at a time."

When I bought my new bike a month ago, I also paid for some $40 bike shorts that weren't in stock but would be available, according to the sales clerk, "any day now." Since the store gave me 20% off anything I purchased along with the bike, I chanced it and purchased the "vaporwear."

The fact that I actually purchased spandex anything, let alone an article of clothing with foam in the butt, should have been a warning to me. If I believed in "signs" or "fate" or any such nonsense, I would have given up and asked for a refund after said garment failed to turn up after one, two, three, and finally four weeks. But no; the pain from my bruised backside was stronger than my pride or vanity, so I faithfully called the store every few days and each time, to their credit, they seemed just as exasperated as I was at the slowness of their distributor.

The other day, I made up my mind that if the shorts weren't in stock when I called, I would demand a refund and just continue riding cushion-less until I developed a sufficiently calloused ass and no longer suffered discomfort during my commute.

I spoke with someone who from previous calls I had determined to be managerial in nature. She apologized profusely for the shorts' continued absence and admitted that, yet again, the stock truck and come and gone without depositing my merchandise.

But before I could demand a refund, she countered with a Supreme Customer Service Move. "They did deliver some more expensive shorts, however," she explained, "and I'll give you a pair of those since you've waited so long."

I went in today and picked up my one-freakin'-hundred dollar bike shorts and found that, in addition, said managerial-type-person had included a $25 gift card and a lovely little note expressing her sorrow over the matter (and, no, it did not include her phone number).

So, for $32, I ended up with $125 worth of merchandise. And I didn't even have to complain.

Ladies and gentleman, I present to you another unsolicited Major Endoresment: BikeSport of Seattle. They kick, and protect, ass!