Random Access

Tuesday – 07 Oct 2008
Happy Birthday to :

Last night, I hung out with SaraRules and her family and watched the rollercoaster (of love… say WHAT!?!) of a game that was Minnesota vs. New Orleans. Wow. There were a LOT of impressive plays in the game:

• Saints QB Drew Brees threw for 330 yards.
• Vikings QB Gus Frerotte threw for 222 yards and engineered a couple of impressive drives, despite taking a beating from the Saints’ defense.
• Saints’ RB Reggie Bush ran for a combined 176 yards, including two (2) punt returns for touchdowns.
• Vikes’ RB Chester Taylor (former Ravens RB) threw a touchdown pass
• And where did Vikings’ CB Antoine Winfield come from?!  He was everywhere. EVERYWHERE. Special teams?  POW!  Defensive line?  BAM!  In the Saints’ backfield?  Yep. He was there, too.

Of course, there were some miscues, too:

• Martin Gramatica’s off-the-mark field goals.
• The Saints’ problems with holding on to the ball.
• Drew Brees’ interceptions.

I just noticed that this week’s NFL passing leaders are Kyle Orton (CHI) with 334 yards and Drew Brees (NO) with 330 yards. Both of them were Boilermakers.

This morning, the alarm went off at 6:20. I did my level best to ignore it. That didn’t work, so I turned off the alarm and laid in bed, pondering the prospect of starting the day.

Somewhere between “pondering” and “starting the day,” I nodded off again.

This is why I have a secondary alarm. It went off. I got up. Yay.

Stray Toasters

• LEGO Eggo waffles.
• WizKids has posted the new Batgirl figure on the Arkham Asylum page, but there’s nothing about it in their news headlines.



• In a rather geeky moment, I realized that 2’x3′ Heroclix maps will fit under the glass top of my living room table.
• 10 IT Power-Saving Myths Debunked
• From the “Whiskey Tango Foxtrot” file: Monkey waiters at restaurant
• Farewell, Opus; Hello, Pete, the Perfectly Practical Pig

Quote of the Day
Today’s nugget of joy comes from an IRC conversation:

(08:54:52) Ahpuc: When you are sitting on an airplane next to someone who is too chatty, what’s your favorite way to end the conversation?
(09:21:36) : Headphones.
(09:21:55) Xeen: falcon punch
(09:22:37) : Or open up manuals on taxidermy… and tell them you’re looking for test subjects.
(09:25:53) *** scratches their head and goes “hmmm!”.
(09:49:27) Ahpuc: A friend of mine was near a chatty 65-70 year odl woman, she was going around to everyone near here, asking what they did, etc…Like meet-me-get-to-know-me day on the damned airplane.
(09:49:55) Ahpuc: When she got to him and asked what he did he said he ran a porn site, and that they were looking for models for some of the sennior citizen porn.
(09:50:03) Ahpuc: She shut up for the whole flight at that point. 🙂
(09:50:10) : nice. 🙂
(09:50:34) : porn’s a good choice for that. It’s enough to shut people up, but not likely to get you thrown off the plane/mobbed like the other likely answers to those questions.
(09:50:37) : Win.
(09:52:50) Ahpuc: I was thinking of riffing off Fight Club: “Insurance Adjuster for the airlines. Do you know how many of these planes actually crash every year, due to poor maintenance? I mean, if it’s not near a big city, they just cover it up, it never sees the press…This airline in particular is notorious for painting over holes in the cabin. Hmm…Does it feel drafty in here to you?”
(09:54:38) : “No english. Arabic?” *fiddles with a box cutter*
(09:54:50) : CHOSEN WEAPON OF MY PEOPLE, BITCH.
(09:54:52) *** has more coffee.
(09:55:45) ***Ahpuc kicks off the airplane.
(09:56:11) : at 30,000 feet? that’s harsh.
(09:56:24) : That was my other thought – just reply only in Arabic.
(09:57:38) : or Esperanto.
(09:57:49) : or swedish chef?
(09:57:53) : klingon.
(09:58:06) : or KKKKKKKKHHHHHAAAAAAAAAAANNNNN!
(09:58:24) : You could just stare at her. Really up close in her face. Wide eyes. don’t say anything.
(09:58:34) : only reply with direct quotes from Airplane!. “looks like i picked the wrong week to stop sniffing glue.”
(09:58:49) Ahpuc: Or reply only with Biblical quotations, carefully chosen for effect.
(09:59:13) : naa. just quote ricardo montalban at ’em.
(09:59:48) Ahpuc: Matthew 10:34 – Think not that I am come to send peace on earth: I came not to send peace, but a sword.

Namaste.

Monday – 06 Oct 2008
Today is my father’s birthday.

His cards have been mailed and I have already called to wish him well today.

Last night, SaraRules and I went over to Chris and Mary’s for (Bad) Horror Movie Night. In SaraRules’ words: The goal isn’t to watch good horror movies, it’s to watch all horror movies. We watched Flight of the Living Dead (Think Day/Dawn/Night/Any-part-of-the-day of the Living Dead meets Snakes on a Plane and you get the idea) and The Shadow Walkers, a “We tried to create genetically engineered warriors and something got out of control… oops” movie. Flight wasn’t horrid; Shadow Walkers was – it was almost like watching Deep Blue Sea, where you started rooting for the shark about halfway through the movie.

Stray Toasters

• This weekend was grey and rainy (until yesterday afternoon, at least).
• This weekend was also LDS General Conference weekend.
• This weekend was also, on a more personally important note, marked my 10th year behind the Zion Curtain.
• By way of SaraRules: Back to black: Phoenix Dance resurrects the race issue
• From NPR: For Pioneering Black Theater, a Season-long Salute
• Sinfest: Damn It Feels Good to Be a Banksta
• By way of NPR Music: Songs for Ill-Advised Office Romances
• Chick Lit that Features Heroines, Not High Heels
  
• Barney Miller
• eBay to Drop 10% of Its Workforce
• Facebook vs. MySpace: Discuss.

Attack the day…

Namaste.

After this morning’s madness, things have calmed down significantly. My personal threat Level has moved down to “Guarded” from “Severe.”

It was nice to get through the rest of the day without wanting to dismember service techs. Or coworkers. Or random strangers.  I skipped lunch, but that just meant that I got to go home earlier. And, as I have food in the fridge: !TANSTAAFL.

Stray Toasters

• I’m picking up a pair of Billy bookcases (Billys? Billies?) from and OnlyAly in a bit. I guess that means I’ll have to prepare for less “theory” and more “practical application” of where to put them.
• By way of Stephanie: Kimono’s Townhouse



• Game Review: LEGO Batman
• My copy of Iron Man is waiting for me at the local Best Buy.
  Online ordering + In-Store Pickup = Win.
• Moo!
• And, as it (somewhat) follows the theme of the ‘Toaster above: Guitar Heifer
• Spicy chili kills amateur chef

And tonight: Scion.

*voop*

Tuesday – 30 Sep 2008
It’s always never a good sign when you get to work and the first thing that the first two people you see say to you is: “The network is down.”

Likewise, it’s definitely not a good thing when the second person adds,”…and I didn’t find that out for myself, [our President/COO] came and asked me about it.”

*grblsnrkx*

I looked at the systems I knew to check and they seemed alright. Next, I started making phone calls. Everything seemed “green” at that point. Then we hit a system that wasn’t looking too happy. And, of course, it was a Linux-based OS… and I’ve been elbow-up in Windows for the past few months. *sigh* So, a call to was in order; fortunately, he was already aware of the issue and was on his way in.

Welcome to Tuesday morning.

Stray Toasters

• In honor of this morning’s problem: The Website Is Down

• I’ve had enough “Do you know the network is down?” questions that I’m considering changing my job title from “System Engineer” to “The Shell Answer Man.”
• Last week, I picked up the TPB of Ultra, by the Luna Brothers. It’s good – very good. It was what introduced me to their work. (I just wish that Girls had been as good…)
• And then there was the issue with the phone system… and the smug service rep who decided to tell me “…you can’t use [type of phone] with [type of conferencing unit].”  Despite the fact that: A) It says that you can in the user’s manual and B) we were sold the unit on the basis of using it with our current phone system.
• 

Perhaps taking an early constitutional is in order.

Namaste.

Today is loonybin88’s birthday:

We’re having fun with our dysfunctional phone system here at work. Yay.

Chew on This: Food for Thought
This I Believe: Caring Makes Us Human

Stray Toasters

• Don’t forget that Breast Cancer Awareness Month starts on Wednesday, 01 Oct 2008.
• From CNN: Bailout plan rejected
• pointed me in the direction of a couple of items about “new” Hershey’s chocolate:
  • What Made Hershey’s Want to Change Chocolate?
  • Hershey’s Changes Chocolate Formula, Millions of People Wonder “WTF?!”
• And, on the Sarah Palin front:
  • Somehow, I missed out on her “Caribou Barbie” nickname until someone pointed it out this weekend.
  • Palin heads to ‘debate camp’ in Arizona
  • McCain retracts Palin’s Pakistan comments
• Bill Murray comments on Ghostbusters 3
• By way of Coworker Dave: A Politician Who “Gets It”
• From NPR: Diahann Carroll Talks of Love, Life and Those Legs

I should probably think about what I want for lunch…

Saturday – 26 Sep 2008
Yesterday, after work, I went to Far West and played Matt in a friendly game of Heroclix. He won. My dice hated me, especially in the middle of the game. They proved this by missing any target number I needed by 1. Almost consistently. But, it was a fun game.

Post-game, I came home and watched part of the Presidential debate with SaraRules. I’m still curious about CNN’s real-time stat tracker, used to get the mood/opinion of Democratic, Independent and Republican voters. I’ll have to look up information on how it was gathered/tallied.

Clitorati was up next.  Coffee, dinner and the conversations were all good. I still need to finish the crossword puzzle I started, though.

This morning, “sleeping in” was over a little after 8:00 AM. I think that I’ve figured out “why” I’ve been getting up so early on the weekends: I have been pushing my weekday wake-up time forward (I’m close to 6:15 at the moment), so my body feels that 7:30 – 8:00 IS sleeping in. Oh, well. SaraRules fixed omelettes and hash browns for breakfast. They were a nice change of pace. Then we got ready for the day.

Today was “Company Party Day,” as both of our companies held their end-of-summer get-togethers today. SaraRules’ was up first; it was at Boondocks. We played mini-golf and arcade games (including Galaga and skeeball) and just hung out for a couple of hours. Next was my party; it was at Lone Peak Park. As this party is our “family-friendly” gathering, they had an inflatable balloon-house where the kids could jump around, a climbing wall, games and cotton candy. It was fun. SaraRules and I ate with Dwim and his wife. We talked about comics and politics and other assorted and sundry things.

We stopped in to say “Hi” to SaraRules’ family on the way back to my place.  They were watching Doom (not to be confused with Dhoom). “Somehow,” I’d managed to miss that movie when it was in theatrical release; seeing it with the family-unit, however, allowed for some prime MST3K-ing.

Wednesday – 24 Sep 2008
Some of my recent forays into The Dreaming have been odd. This morning, my subconscious apparently found a rather twisted path along the wildways in a dark area of The Dreaming… and skipped merrily along its way. Thus, I’ve been awake (for the most part) since 5:30 this morning, thanks to a lovely dream about my apartment being broken into. It was “a little” disturbing. After proving to myself that it was just a dream – but being too keyed up to sleep – I wound up sprawled on the couch watching SportsCenter. I apparently dialed down enough to nod off somewhere around 6:10. Just in time for the alarm to go off at 6:20. Yay.

Last night was very uneventful. I played my guitar for the first time in weeks. Adam called while I was cooking dinner – baked chicken over spaghetti, with a side of spinach; he had picked up The Invincible Iron Man animated movie that came out last year and had a couple of questions about it and how it related to the mainstream Iron Man. That led to questions about Watchmen – he’d seen the trailer and wanted to know if it was based on a comic. I told him that it was and that he should check it out. He then suggested the new Fox series, Fringe, to me. The show happened to be just starting as I finished cooking, so I watched it. It was good, but it may take a week or two to fully grow on me.

I also read two-and-a-half TPBs of Gotham Central (1, 2, 3). I had read the first and second ones before, but it has been a few months; I’d forgotten their storylines. I like what I’ve read of the third book, which I will probably finish tonight.

Stray Toasters

• Jeff came by – to ask if SaraRules had already gone by (she had) – and noticed a pile of hard drives near my desk. He asked what we were planning on doing with the dead ones. I told him that we were keeping them aside and preparing them for destruction/disposal. He said that if it involved thermite or shredding, he wanted to watch. That reminded me of a video of a BMW getting shredded. I contacted Oracle for information on the video, which was on YouTube. But, there was a link to the main shredding site, where I had originally seen the video – SSI: Watch It Shred!
• Blend-Tec: Will It Blend?
• By way of SaraRules and the “Whiskey Tango Foxtrot” file: PETA Urges Ben & Jerry’s to Use Human Milk
• By way of : Former National Review Editor Endorses Obama
• I think that I need this t-shirt.
• SaraRules, Tyranist, and could probably use this t-shirt.
• What is the nature of an IT worker?
• For the gamers: World’s largest wargaming table art installation

…right on to the friction of the day.

Namaste.

Tuesday – 23 Sep 2008
Guess who’s having Eggo LEGO waffles for breakfast.
Mm-hmm, that’s right.
I am.

Last night’s tourney was a wash: Only Chris and I showed. So, Keith basically rolled the dice: I “won,” Chris got Fellowship. The prizes were a Johnny Storm LE ‘Clix. With the “formalities” over, Chris, Keith, Nano and I played a four-way free-for-all. Since it was a just a fun game to kill some time, I tried a random team:

• Batman
• Captain America (Ultimates)
• Deathstroke and
• Psycho-Pirate

Chris rolled with his usual Batman team, with a special guest star:

• Batman
• The Flash
• Green Arrow and
• Johnny Storm LE

Nano played with:

• Batman and Robin (dual figure)
• Big Barda and Mister Miracle (Green Lantern)
• Green Arrow

Keith brought the Fantastic Four (starter set), including the Sue Storm and Johnny Storm LE figures. I have two things to say about this team:

1. Watching someone play the FF as a team – and play them well – is a thing of beauty.
2. Getting beat down by that same someone/team is a bittersweet pill… though still fun.

I think that my dice thought that we were playing a game of “Suicide ‘Clix,” because I couldn’t hit my target numbers half the time. I wore down a couple members of the FF, but Keith wound up taking me out. Chris and Nano duked it out on the far side of the board, with Chris winning that fight. Then it came down to Chris and Keith. They danced around the playing field a bit, but Keith finally wound up taking Chris out.

After the game, I headed over to SaraRules’ to hang out with her and her family and watch Monday Night Football. (Four shots at a two-point conversion – FOUR – and you THROW it?! ALL FOUR TIMES?!?) Her parents just returned from a ten-day Oregon excursion and it sounded like they had a lot of fun. And, as an unexpected bonus, they brought back some smoked Brie.

Back home. Chilled on the couch… started nodding off on the couch… called it a night. However, before I hit the rack, I watched a little of The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson. One of his guests was Marianne Jean-Baptiste, from Without a Trace. I don’t think that I’d ever heard her speak out of character, so I was “a little” surprised to hear a British accent.

This morning, I saw SaraRules drive by as she headed to work.
In a rare occurrence, she apparently saw me – and Jeff, a coworker with whom I was talkin – as well.

Stray Toasters

• Bit is speaking!
  Her first word: “Dada”
  Bot is not so amused.
  From last night’s conversation with :

  11:00 hahaha bot is ragingly annoyed
  11:00 and thusly i am ragingly amused
  11:00 bit’s first word today
  11:00 or in the words of rana
  11:00 I SPEND ALL DAY WITH THIS CHILD
  11:00 I CHANGE HER DIAPERS
  11:00 I FEED HER
  11:00 EVERY
  11:00 DAY
  11:00 EVERY NIGHT
  11:01 AND WHAT’S HER FIRST WORD?!!?
  11:01 DADA!!!
  11:01 lol life is good

• A new trailer for Quantum is Solace is out.
• SaraRules pointed out a video that I neglected to check out from yesterday’s Muppet ‘Toaster:

  Watch it all the way to the end…

• Some 640,000 Texans still without power
• Did Howard Mackie and John Byrne plan on pulling a “One More Day/Brand New Day” kind of stunt in the 90s? You bet they did. Details here.
• 15 train robbers killed by poison gas
• MarknTyme: You’ll have to check this out when you get home: Habenera

And that’s that… for now.

Namaste.

There’s been lots to do this morning. Still a good bit to attend to. And, to be honest, there’s a part of me that’s kind of apathetic about getting them done before I leave today.

I think that a good portion of that could be put under the heading of *grblsnrkx*

But, it’s Friday.
And the work portion of it is almost over.
Selah.

Stray Toasters

• This is a design available on a new t-shirt from Despair.com:



• And now, today’s episode of “Could You Be a Superhero?”
  • If you could have one power – just ONE – what would it be?
  • Who would you tell?
  • Would you wear some form of costume/uniform or not?
• 
• Prophet 6-0-0-9-1…

Namaste.

Friday – 12 Sep 2008
Last night, SaraRules came over and fixed dinner (fajitas!) and we watched The West Wing and 21. Nice, quiet evening in. After SaraRules left, I hopped on the nerd and surfed for a while. Then – in a stroke of genius – I decided to stretch out on the couch “for a few minutes.”

That turned into 3 hours.

I woke up and dragged myself to bed. That’s when the odd, 21-inspired dreams set in. Thugs, money and lots of running. Whoop-de-damn-doo.

So far, the work day hasn’t been too bad.
And, it’s Friday. A short Friday, to boot.
Win-Win.

Stray Toasters

• As 2008 Multicultural Week draws to a close, I am reminded of this post that sent me back in July.
• Folks were talking about WoW‘s Harvest Festival in a chat forum this morning; that reminded me that it’s almost time for the 2008 CoH Hallowe’en Event.
• Speaking of Hallowe’en: Dress up your PS3
• 
• The CrüxShadows 2008 US tour brings them to SLC on the 28th. Hm.
• Sunday’s Ravens game has been moved to Monday night, thanks to Hurricane Ike. I’m not sure if there will be coverage outside the Baltimore and Texas areas.
• Your Mama Don’t Dance and Your Daddy Don’t Rock and Roll
• Vintage Monkey Cartoons
  
• 
• LEGO Album Covers on Flickr

Soon: Hometime
Next: Lunch with SaraRules
Later: Errands… and maybe a pickup game of ‘Clix

Namaste.

Wednesday – 10 September 2008
Two down.
One in the chamber.
Two to go.

So far, it’s been a quiet morning. I’m not complaining about that. I have a few tasks on my “to do” list that should keep me occupied – if not “busy” – for the better part of the morning.

Last night, I headed to Far West for a HeroClix tourney… but the judge didn’t show. So.. um.. yeah. Chris, Ma’afu, Nano and I just decided on a two-on-two game. 1000 points per team. We played on the Castle Doom map that came with the Fantastic Four Starter Set. I am not a fan of that map. In fact, I’d say that it’s in my top three least-favorites. Ma’afu and Nano brought some bruisers to the dance; Chris and I brought Perplex and Outwit users. Chris lost a couple of figures in the fight, but we wound up winning.

After the game, I headed up to visit SaraRules for a bit before heading home. And, in the course of talking about quilting, I think that I’ve been drafted to help her with at least one upcoming project. That should prove interesting.

Stray Toasters

• Diversity Milk. That still cracks me up.
• Thanks to , I have a new icon:



• How to Dress Like a Rich Man in a Recession
• From NPR Music:
  • Make Peace, Make Jazz
  • Radiohead: Live in Concert (downloadable podcast)
• Mommy, Why Is There a Server in the House?
• 
  …and…
  
• From BBC News: The white priestess of ‘black magic’
• To Odin, Thanks For Everything! – Loki

Namaste.

Julie (our Property Manager), just came up to me and asked if I had gotten a – and I quote – “Diversity Cookie.”

Background: This week has been deemed 2008 Multicultural Week by our robot overlords protectors:

We are being treated to webcasts and on *ahem* “Patriot Day” (which I still think is the most inane possible name for the day), we are having a barbecue. But, I digress. “Diversity Cookies.”

Apparently, there were also frown-faced cookies, but they went very quickly, from what I understand.

Then I looked around at the other items on the table and found something that actually made me laugh out loud:

That’s right, kids: “Diversity Milk.”

I don’t often read Penny Arcade, but with nuggets of joy like this one, I might have to add it to the daily queue:

Thursday – 04 September 2008
Wow. The day is better than half over and I’m just getting to this. It’s been a busy day, but that’s good because it has also been productive.

Last night, SaraRules and I had a date night. There are, indeed, definite perks to living in the same city. We had dinner (spaghetti, homemade sauce, garlic bread and a bottle of Pinot Noir) and decided to watch TV rather than a movie. We watched… three (I think) episodes of Project Runway, with an episode of The West Wing and an episode of Cold Case thrown in for me. It was a nice way to spend the evening.

Today, aside from being busy, was also sushi and comics (and a couple boxes of ‘Clix) day. Tonight, there will be packing for tomorrow’s camping trip… and maybe, just maybe, a little CoH before bed.

Stray Toasters

• For the third day in a row, I’ve been able to see SaraRules as she drives past the office on her way to work. This morning was a bit of a fluke, though: I got to the office and happened to be looking out the window and she drove by; I was fairly certain that I would have missed her by a few minutes and wasn’t expecting to catch her today. When I talked with her a little later, she asked me if this was becoming a new tradition; I told her that I didn’t know… but that if it did, it was one that I was beginning to like. What can I say? It makes for a fun – if odd – start to the day.
• Tonight is the beginning of the 2008 NFL season!
• As I’ve mentioned before, I have an… unusual… desktop wallpaper image. One that gets noticed. This week, it got attention from our COO, in fact. The image is a Photoshop-manipulated version of the cover from Incognegro, which is discussed in this article from BoingBoing.
• By way of ThinkGeek: The Encyclopedia Shatnerica
• Abandoned Space Technology
• had an interesting item in a recent post: Apples to Apples – a look at the current presidential/vice presidential tickets compared to tickets of the past 30 or so years.
  
• Star Wars + LEGO + Olympics = Imperial Sportstroopers Invade Beijing Olympics
• Elderly Superheroes Never Looked So Good!
• 
• Linux Motivational Posters
• From the “Whiskey Tango Foxtrot” files:
  • Elephant cured of drug addiction
  • Girls warned playing didgeridoo could cause infertility
• Dad builds dream tree house
• Evolution of the AT-AT

Bonus Points to anyone who knows – without looking it up – the relevance of today’s title AND what it’s from.

Namaste.

Tuesday – 02 September 2008
And so, another – thankfully short – work week begins. I’m going camping with SaraRules and her family this Friday. That should prove… interesting. And undoubtedly fun.

Yesterday was a low-key day, as a holiday should be:

• Sleeping in.
• A couple of episodes of The West Wing.
• Tooling around town, including a stop at Gardner Village.
• Dinner with SaraRules’ family.
• City of Heroes.
• The Middleman season finale.

All-in-all, it was a good day.

Stray Toasters

• Congrats to SaraRules on starting her new job!




• We have a new guy starting in IT today. Selah.
• Sunday’s trip to IKEA bore some fruit… including some geeky fruit. I picked up a KUBBO light. I got a green globe to go on it. Why? Because then, I could do this:

  

  …and this…

  

• I was surprised to read news items about Governor Palin’s daughter in the news.
  I was even more surprised – pleasantly so – to hear Senator Obama’s reaction:

  “Let me be as clear as possible,” Obama said. “I think people’s families are off-limits, and people’s children are especially off-limits. This shouldn’t be part of our politics. It has no relevance to Gov. Palin’s performance as governor or her potential performance as a vice president.” (Full story, from CNN)
  

  I was similarly impressed with the way that he reminded the media that he was born to a young mother and that reporters should “…back off these kinds of stories.”

• How to make a papercraft Masonic Lodge
• By way of BoingBoing: Hot 8 Brass Band
• How to make a 3-D printer out of LEGO

Attack the day like birds of prey…

Namaste.