turtle_island

11:54 am: Finally, a place for my leprous bretheren: the Open Sores Convention
I attended Open Source Bridge this week.  Well, I volunteered at it and got a free pass, if that counts. 

Thoughts:

• I learned so many new acronyms and geeky terms: OSS (Open Source Somethingorother... although, to me, it's still reminiscent of the WWII spy acronym. Q:"What are you working on?"  A:"I'm sorry, I can't tell you. OSS, you know..."), FLOSS (what you do to free teeth from the tyrannical burden of paid food), FTW (although the game never seems to end with this statement), and that "epic FAIL!" is now passe, to be replaced with more-creative dinosaur-based FAILs (Raptor FAIL. T-Rex FAIL... maybe derived from misquoting the geek in-joke "epoch" FAIL?)).
• Netbooks make awesome note takers. There were a lot in circulation: 10% of laptops visibile, maybe? I'd say about 50% of laptops visible were recent-issue Macbooks-- Apple has good penetration in the geek crowd.  But omg-- loud keyboards should be banned.  Your clickyclick is driving me crazycrazycrazy.  Learn to not pound your laptop when typing!
• Wow, there are some awesome coders out there. I'm continually impressed with the local high level of geek proficiency, but also with the collaborative network that has been formed.  I feel like an outsider and lurker right now, but I'll definitely be more forward in my sociability and volunteerism.
• Most mind-blowing presentation award: Markus Robers and Matt Youell's presentation "Spindle, Mutilate and Metaprogram: How far can you push it before there be dragons?" (code here).  They demonstrated SO MANY concepts that I had never been exposed to.  I learned to never raise my hand or risk being pelted with candy.  I made a big list of long, complicated words to google based on this presentation. Also: most props award.
• Best question posed to me: what is the state of open source hardware?  Why doesn't it exist? What the hell is it?  Boy, did I have to explore my own ass for that one.  I blamed the lack of quality tools.  And the lack of incentive for companies to support it, as long as they own the final funnel to the device / chip / board.   But there also has to be some blame for hardware dudes being solo / too proud / antisocial / unwilling to collaborate...  (although organizations like DorkbotPDX disproves with that last statement.  Like I said, I was talking out my ass.)

And then I got a migraine and lost a day and a half.  Ugh.  If I sound discombobulated, it's because I'm just emerging from its long shadow.

10:35 am: let's talk about your passwords
"Dear Hackers, I'm going to be changing all the passwords to all my internet logins soon, so if you're going to launch an attack on me, do it now."

How long has it been since you've changed your passwords?  For me, a little too long.  I've been using the same password system for a few years now, and I really think it's past-due time to reroll my security. 

( My current system sucks... )

( ... so I had to get some new ideas. )

12:52 pm: The Beginner's Guide to Malaysian Politics

I just finished reading a New Yorker article "Eastern Promises", which stories the rise and fall and rise again of Malaysian politician Anwar Ibrahim. 

The article writer does a remarkable job in tying together the various threads of modern Malaysian politics:  nepotism, the New Economic Policy (NEP), "The Malay Dilemma" and the long shadow of former PM Mahanthir, Malaysiakini, ethnic politics, and Islamic-secularist tensions. 
( ... and I've got a lot of opinion on that.  )

07:31 am: .... that was quick
Nanny died in her sleep Saturday morning, making a quick end to her week-long hospice.   What a way to go!   In our house, tended by myself and my dad.  She had her marbles through the end.  She saw and said goodbye to my sisters last weekend.  
The funeral is Wednesday.

04:26 pm: Hospice
For those of you who don't know (and I'd assume that'd be most of you), I'm back at my parents' place in Belmont at the moment.

But the reasons for my sudden return are not so great.  Nanny, my grandmother, has gone into hospice, and is on her deathbed.  I've returned to Belmont at the request of my family to help out with whatever needs helping out.  I'll be here for as long as my help is needed, or "for the duration" as some have phrased.  I'll be working from Belmont as well, further limiting my free time.

On the flip side, my sister Claire is due to give birth in less than a month, so maybe I'll be around for that.

When I arrived on Sunday, my Nanny was talkative and interactive.  We talked a bit, she had a few sips of my coffee, a strawberry...  we entertained family guests, chatted on the phone with relatives...   I was able to help her move around, get her things she wanted, entertain her with stories, or just sit around and keep her company. 

As of yesterday, she hasn't been taking any solids or liquids (other than pain medication) and is bed ridden.  She's uncommunicative.  She sleeps a lot, and stares off into space when awake. Her vital signs are still ok, so she'll be around for a while, but she's spiritually disconnecting from the world.   It's just taking her body a while to catch up. 

There's now less for me to do.  I fixed up my parents' TiVo to work with their Comcast box.  I bought myself a Slingbox over Craigslist. Today I rode my dad's bike to the local library to get some exercise and a book to read (finally, some cardio!) Dropped by Lorenzo's Sandwich shop for some good local comfort food.  So, I'm taking care of myself.    But still, it's an interesting journey. 

10:08 am: Twilight
Anyone read the whole Twilight series?  You know, the books?   Are they any good?

08:32 pm: The California vacation begins!
Day 1 of vacation:  drive from PDX to Chico, CA. Stop to see Ashland (what a quaint city!).  Stay with sister Heidi, her husband James, and little 9-month old Mark.
Day 2:  Wildflower hiking on Table Mountain, Oregon City covered bridge, Cherokee, Chico Kite Day, and home to a Double James Burger.  Tired!

11:12 am: Portland's economic slowdown
I read a pretty good New York Times article about Portland's economic woes, and its ties to the housing market. As a consultant (aka "small business"), I can feel the slowdown in my leads, and the number of hours I can charge. (If those hours became "0", do I count as "unemployed"?). I've been following the local real estate market with interest. I'd say now is the right time to buy, if you can afford it!

02:17 pm: Daft Punk-- eat your heart out!
This is the most amazing thing I've seen all year.



How does he DO it?

Kutiman remixes YouTube. He remixes YOU. US! We are the future we seek!

And he's not a one-hit wonder thing, either. Watch to some of the other remixes. Awesome, every one.

I was "turned on" by a posting at 43Folders, Merlin Mann''s productivity blog. (This blog has, paradoxically, made me less productive as I obsess over it.) And I'm feeling quite unproductive today. :(

01:27 pm: March Maaaaaadness!
I scored 2 tickets to the first game of the NCAA tournament here in Portland. Have no idea who is playing (no one does! Bracket gets chosen on Sunday), but it's a chance to see some awesome high-level, high-intensity basketball (as opposed to the Portland Trailblazers! ptuey!).

I'm not really a basketball fan, but my girlfriend is. So now I'm learning all about the tournament before the game. I'm interested in participating in a bracket online. Anyone running one?

05:41 pm: The Watchmen conundrum
... I just know it's going to suck. I just know it. The comic book is so full of subtlety and layer, there's no way that this will smoothly convert to a movie. So, my friends, I entreat you to read the book first.

But... I have to see this movie!

http://www.pvponline.com/2009/03/02/ombudsmen/

05:33 pm: The Groundhog Cantata
Videos from my housemate's Groundhog Day Party. It's awesome living with musicians! :)
Written by my housemate, Elinor.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O3pmW4M-27I (Part One)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zn0fqCuUlUY (Part Two)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=adbpKY-8UKA (Part Three)

You won't find me singing in the videos. I'm usually around the corner, taking pictures. ;)

12:19 pm: yesterday was a wonderful day
Skateboarding at the DoS on my RipStik, and an absolutely gorgeous rainbow in the sky. What more could I want?

12:48 pm: blue hair and clam chowder
It's about this time of year that I start getting emails that read "OMG! I thought I saw you on TV! With short blue hair, eating clam chowder!".

Yes, that was me.

... so the story is, about 10 years ago I attended the Santa Cruz Clam Chowder Cook-Off, when this guy with a video camera approaches me and asks me to ham it up while taking a bite of chowder. I didn't think anything of it at the time...

It was my 0.15 seconds of fame. But I guess being repeated in a commercial every year for 9 years certainly adds up. (Where's my residuals check?)

So, to answer your questions:
No, I'm not back in Santa Cruz (I'm living in Portland, Oregon). I don't have blue hair anymore (it turned aquamarine, then a cool mottled green... then I tried something different). But I still love me some chowdah.

06:23 pm: iTunes: getting rid of duplicates
Now that I actually have a huge drive, I can re-consolidate my mp3 collection onto my main drive.

Horray for iDupe! Sure, iTunes has the "Show Duplicates" function.... but it's still a huge chore to go through the whole list (1000+) deleting every 2nd one...

02:53 pm: 1.5 years with a Macbook
I upgraded my measly (!) 120GB internal Macbook hard drive to a whopping 500GB drive this morning. It was this week's $99 special at Fry's. Now I should have enough space to fit my entire MP3 collection on my laptop, as well as have plenty of space left over to experiment with an Ubuntu VMware virtual machine!

You know, it's been over a year and a half since I broke down and bought myself a Macbook. As with all great anniversaries, now would be a great time to revisit why the hell I got into this in the first place, and evaluate how well it's paid off for me.
( A long review... )
Conclusion:
MacOS is great! ... if you pay to fill in the holes with 3rd party SW (VMware). But some holes can't be filled yet: like the rest of the world's dependence upon Windows.

08:56 pm: oh WoW
Yes, I actually enrolled for the 10-day trial. I've made a Mage. Anyone want to help out a noob? You can find me on the Cenarion Circle server, under the "Wintre" name.
It's just like crack-- I can quit when I want to, right?

11:53 am: Google Sync difficulties
I decided to try out Google's new contact sync option. What a mistake!

The first step is to sync your Google Contacts with your Address Book.

That produced 155 "conflicts" that I had to resolve, most of which were due to whitespaces or categorizing a phone number as "other" rather than "home".

Then, I noticed that my Address Book contacts ballooned from about 300 contacts to over 800. Most of them are duplicates (even IDENTICAL duplicates! Come on! Resolve these automatically!), or people that I emailed once or twice, and do NOT want to contact ever again.

I've been spending the last two hours using Google's Contact Manager page to either delete some of the entries or merge them together. But it feels like this'll take forever to sort out. :(

05:10 pm: a new bird feeder

I've been doing a lot of birding lately. Two weekends ago I went to Fanno Creek, where I watched a bald eagle (my first!) scare the living crap out of ducks. I wanted to encourage my learning, especially of the LBJ (little brown jobbers) that hang out in neighborhood. So last weekend I bought and installed a new bird feeder outside my window. Because of the presence of squirrels in our trees, I bought the Brome Squirrel Buster Classic wild bird feeder.

Birds seen at my birdfeeder today: female & male junkos, song sparrow, and some sort of long skinny bird that looked like a swallow (but that wouldn't be eating seed, right?). Because I was looking all day, I noticed a few birds hanging around that haven't ventured to the feeder yet: scrub jays, starlings, a northern flicker, and quite a few robins bouncing around.

02:09 pm: ...iz gore-meh!
I made my first lasagne last night! It's been something I've desired to do for a while, found myself with a bit of time before I was hungry, and just decided to jump into. It was a onion-spinach-eggplant-mushroom-beef lasagne, with 3 layers of sauce-noodle-cheese. Not bad for a first try. I learned lots of lessons for my next attempt (more spices in sauce, more ricotta, eggplant is tricky, overlap the noodles, etc.). I made two pies. Even by sharing with girlfriend and housemates, I figure I won't have to cook again for a week!