Someone Buy Me A 2007 Calendar (NSFW Reblog)

UIUC's College of Engineering has gotten a lot more swingin' (perhaps slightly NSFW) since I was there! And everyone needs a calendar... Read all about it.

Where is the College of Liberal Arts & Sciences' calendar?

My Relative Importance

So it turns out my wife "reads" this blog. Which I expected.

This is how she reads it: she scans to see if there are any new pictures of our pets. She doesn't read any of the actual words.

Pictures which, I might add, she has already seen anyway, as she herself took them and downloaded them from her digital camera.

She clearly knows too much about the importance of the things I say.

John C. Wright's Blog (Recommendation)

CMD shared an item in his Google Reader feed today that led me to John C. Wright's blog. It is currently mostly filled with his thoughts on the difference between "great books" and "genre books", and whether there are any SF/Fantasy books that can be considered great. His blog is interesting reading, and I must thank CMD a second time (as he also gave me my first Wright book to read).

Wright is a worthwhile genre offer himself whose works I have enjoyed a lot recently, despite some sour Ayn Randish notes at the very end of his Everness dilogy. His books also contain nascent stirrings of some of the same misogynistic notes which Wright complains of in his blog about Heinlein's Stranger in a Strange Land. Of course, I forgive those tendencies in Gene Wolfe, and I find I can forgive them so far in Wright.

Real World: Your Government

I was listening to Fresh Air just a few minutes ago while taking the dog out for a constitutional. Terry Gross was interviewing Senator Chuck Schumer (D-NY), and described the D.C. row house he and some Democratic friends crash in as being something out of The Real World.

Which gave me an idea for the greatest political television show of all time. Place in one house:

• Two U.S. Representatives, one Republican and one Democratic.
• Two U.S. Senators, one Republican and one Democratic.
• A sitting Supreme Court Justice.
• One or two Undersecretaries of something-or-other.
• A high-level Pentagon staffer.
• A U.S. General (at least two stars please).
• Two dark-horse announced Presidential candidates, again one Republican and one Democratic.

Film.

Any recommendations? I think Minority Whip Trent Lott (R-MS) would work well. Senator Robert Byrd (D-WV) would be another excellent candidate, with his filibuster of the 1964 Civil Rights Act and past KKK membership giving him immediate emotional resonance with his cross-party rivals.

Norway Kicks Butt (Reblog)

Norway is my favorite country of the moment, and here's why. Maybe they'll tackle Vista next?

HDTV Drooling

Oh, sooo close to my magical $1,000 price point! Amazon has the Westinghouse LVM-42W2 for only $1,308.88.

My criterion:

• $1,000 or less.
• 42" or more.
• 1080p.

Desirable:

• Contrast ratio of at least 10,000:1 for halfway decent blacks. The Westinghouse is only 1,000:1. A commonly accepted "decent" value is 1,500:1.
• 16ms response time. I couldn't find out the Westinghouse's response time -- the manufacturer's web site is currently toast, always a good sign.
• Remote controlled rotating and tilting wall mount! Oh yeah baby!

Warning: Naughty Bits (Recommendation)

This is a short, light film I really enjoyed by young British filmmaker Sean Ellis.

Vista Satanica (Reblog)

Vista is here, and it is bringing with it a deep and presumably long-lasting entrenchment of DRM in all our computing devices. Peter Gutmann has written a very interesting business cost analysis of Vista's DRM support. My favorite quote from the Final Thoughts: "The only reason I can imagine why Microsoft would put its programmers, device vendors, third-party developers, and ultimately its customers, through this much pain is because once this copy protection is entrenched, Microsoft will completely own the distribution channel."

There is a lot to hate about Vista's "content protection", such as Microsoft's ability to revoke a driver if they think it is leaking premium, protected content. So you and your 2007 Vista-compatible video card are humming merrily along, and in 2008 some clever high school student figures out a hack to record premium content with that card. Microsoft revokes the driver, and until the manufacturer updates it, you're looking at a blank screen (at least where premium content is concerned). And the manufacturer is sure going to have lots of incentive to revisit old drivers when instead they can make you buy new hardware...

I remember a time when Microsoft claimed their development was driven by the needs of the consumer.

(Image is from the previously recommended xkcd web comic.)

These Paws Were Made For Walking (Pets, Reblog)

We've recently gotten a license and started taking 'Dolon to a local county dog park, where what there is to his brain automatically disconnects and he totally abandons us until run down and forcibly removed. It is clear that there is no amount of exercise we could give him which would be too much. But I have to spend the entire day sitting at my computer reading blogs!

Bandit's owner at our doggy obedience class told us that Bandit uses their treadmill. Now I even believe it to be true. On sale for only 31,290円 plus shipping! Courtesy of TokyoMango.

Die, Blackboard, Die (Reblog)

About time. Blackboard's totally crap-tacular "e-learning" patent is going to be re-examined and hopefully overturned. As if online education began in 1997, instead of in the '60's. Even if you insist that something about the Internet or web sites makes electronic delivery of educational material unique, they will drown in prior art. Major kudos to the Software Freedom Law Center, which does accept donations.

Ukiyo-e (Recommendation)

Who doesn't love ukiyo-e? 浮世絵 are woodblock prints "of the floating world". There are a couple of pretty nice galleries of ukiyo-e available online.

• Thomas Crossland's substantial gallery. This gallery also has lots of information about the history of ukiyo-e.
  


• Jim Breen's gallery. This gallery contains many links to other ukiyo-e galleries as well. Jim Breen is also justly famous for his contributions to electronic English-Japanese dictionaries.

The print above is Moonlight at Seichoen by Hasui.

Frilled Shark (Reblog)

The Awashima Marine Park in Japan caught a female frilled shark today, filming it before its death a few hours later. The video is available from the preceding Reuters article link.

Awashima Marine Park is pretty nifty; it is actually its own artifical island in Uchiura Bay, 静岡県. It is a part of the well-known Numazu tourist hub.

More Slumber (Pets)

Every. Single. Night.

Microsoft Patenting Data Longevity (Reblog)

I find Microsoft's patent application for "immortal information storage" particularly amusing given that its success is built on ephemera. Not to single them out -- the entire computer software industry really wants consumers to have to throw everything away on a regular cycle to keep their income flowing. And again, why are things like this patentable? Our patent system needs reform, if not in exactly the way that Microsoft desires. Organizations like the Public Patent Foundation clearly need more money.

Slumber (Pets)

This is what I must disturb nearly every night when I decide it is finally time to go upstairs to bed.

Ethiopian Candids (Chow)

Someone wanted to see what the final product looks like when we prepare Ethiopian food, so we snapped shots of some leftovers last night. Kudos to my actually fairly short wife for the bird's eye shot. In that picture starting just left of twelve o'clock and moving clockwise, we have:

• Mesir wat, made with lentils.
• Sega wat, made with lamb.
• Asa wat, made with fish.
• Cabbage, potato, and carrot alicha. This is basically a wat without berbere.
• Vegetable wat.

Everything is separated with a lettuce, cucumber, and tomato salad and served over injera. Additional injera is served with the platter as utensils.

Lap Dog (Pets)

'Dolon wouldn't cause me much trouble during the day if I let him do this when I was at my desk. (Rejected on ergonomic grounds.)

Wolfewatch

A new Gene Wolfe short story, "The Hour of the Sheep", has arrived in the anthology Fast Forward 1.

'Dolon Obeys, Briefly (Pets)

'Dolon has graduated from his first obedience class, and there are photos. Unfortunately, just like in high school, you don't actually have to learn anything to graduate.

Ogle While You Listen (Reblog)

While I use this primarily for drooling over Kate Bush, anybody interested in rock-pop-type-stuff who wants some poor-quality eye candy to go along with their tunes should check out ZonTube. It mashes together Amazon's music database with videos available on Youtube.

Tasty Ethiopia (Chow)

To celebrate Natalie's father's birthday we made Ethiopian food yesterday. And because it is a bit of a deal to manufacture we're re-gifting it today for the rest of the zoo vets... After the process of making the berbere, niter kebbeh, and other spice-related elements, everything is quite simple save the injera.

We make a sleazy injera, because we don't like waiting around several days, and we don't have a cool clay oven or one of the big modern circular injera grills. Although one of the grills would be really cool if we had a place to put it. Our injera is the one place that our Ethiopian cuisine falls down, and there is still a lot of experimentation going on. The proper elasticity is what is really escaping us, the injera tends to be too frangible to be a really effective utensil.

Our current injera recipe takes 1¼c all-purpose flour, 3/4c teff, ½c self rising flour, 2½t active dry yeast, and 2½c water and lets the mixture sit and bubble overnight. Just before cooking, add ½t baking soda. You should end up with a thin batter. Over medium-high heat, wipe your crepe pan down with oil and cook about a 3mm pancake of dough for 30-45 seconds. Cover and cook another 30-45 seconds. You should end up with a nice round piece of thin bread full of bubbles. Slide it out and repeat, and repeat, and repeat, and repeat...

Our pseudo-authentic berbere uses 2t cumin seed, 1t cadamom, 1½t allspice, 1t fenugreek seeds, 1t coriander, 8 cloves, 1t black peppercorns, 5t red pepper, 1T grated ginger, 1t turmeric, 1t salt, 3t paprika, and ½t cinnamon, toasting all the seeds and then grinding everything up. Careful inhaling, it is wonderful but powerful.

Our equally Maxsonized niter kebbeh starts off with a bubbling pound of butter -- for your health. Then for an hour on low heat cook ½c chopped onion, 2 cloves minced garlic, 2t grated ginger, ½t turmeric, 4 crushed cardamom seeds, 1 cinnamon stick, 2 cloves, ¼ grated nutmeg, ¼t ground fenugreek seeds, and 1T fresh basil. Pour it through a cheesecloth and refrigerate until you need it.

With those two accessories we make any wat we feel like. My favorite atakilt (vegetable) wats involve cabbage and zucchini, the master vegetable. Last night we also made a tilapia wat and a lamb wat.

Mmm. If any readers who know where we live ever want to visit, let us know a day or two in advance and we can whip some up for you.

Roast The Justice League (Reblog)

I've been lusting after videos I can't ever get recently for some reason (I love you Kate Bush!), and I stumbled across an unexpected object of desire in that vein. Apparently in 1979 there was a live-action Justice League roast starring, among others, Adam West and Burt Ward as Batman and Robin. Yes, a roast. With the Justice League. Live. In tights. Roasting each other. A précis of sorts is available.

I so have to see this. Maybe eBay will help me inflict this on myself.

Garbled Jenny

Does anyone here who subscribes to Jenny's Google Reader feed have the same problem I do, that it is unrenameable? It really, really wants to be called "Items shared by Jenny".

DRM Is Just Misunderstood (Reblog)

Secretely, DRM loves both you and your sexy, sexy wallet.

The Mighty Duck

Field reports have come in that our stealth duck has triumphed over all available Johns.

Rilo Kiley (Recommendation)

MGC turned me on to Rilo Kiley today. They are an indie folk-rock group (of former child stars) with a talent for writing pop lyrics your brain may actually be willing to listen to. Jenny Lewis provides enticing vocals. They are, however, much more at the "pop" end of the spectrum, both musically and lyrically, than something like Roads To Moscow. (Al Stewart is too forgotten to be floating around the Internet much, so please forgive the underlayed videogame footage.)

Recommended for both the Lite Brite animations as for the song: It's A Hit. Also, Bulletproof, Portions For Foxes, The Frug.

What About The Anthropophagic Principle? (Reblog)

In a book review on Slashdot today, the reviewer characterized the book's author as "highly skeptical of many string theorists' reliance on the Anthropomorphic Principle". Well. While I consider it fundamentally correct to be skeptical of anything related to string theory, I think this was an unfair outing of the poor theorists. Does their anthropic principle know that they're seeing another principle behind its back?

I don't mean to excoriate the reviewer, whose review is fairly cogent. But those Slashdot editors need to be taken out behind the chemical shed.

Comments?

CMD and I were chatting about whether there was a comments feed for Blogger, and I stumbled across this hack. Should I try to set this up? Comment :-)

Too Little Too Late (Reblog)

This won't really help matters, but it is certainly something I wish I'd thought of a decade ago. Alan Cox, a developer working for Red Hat, has filed a patent on software DRM. Red Hat's patent policy indicates that, if granted, such a patent would be used to defend open-source software rather than licensed to businesses.

Microsoft is surely not quaking in its boots, even if this isn't refused due to copious prior art.

Still, it makes you wonder about all the horrible things Big Software is waiting to do with our lovely computers. It sure would be nice to use our broken patent system to start patenting some of that future-evil today.

Armagnac Gnummy

For the first time ever, I think the best drink I was served by my local oenophile CRB was not a wine, but an Armagnac. Now, I'm not very knowledgeable about wine, even in my selected Rhône niche, but that doesn't stop me from being an opinionated ass. And luckily, CRB is polite enough to not call me on any of my posturing. This Armanac beat out a very nice Gigondas which I would be happy to sample again, a fine Côtes du Rhône Villages, and some other varieties of brandy, Scotch, and Port.

No, I'm not a lush.

I'd share more information about this scrumptious Armagnac, but I'm reliant on CRB reading this posting and sending me a photo of its label. It is from a small (even for Armagnac) producing region that doesn't export, so it is has proven difficult to hunt it up on the web.

This repast serves as a reminder that I have to get CRB & CEA together for an extended evening of chow, as my two friends who I think are most gustatorily appreciative. And, of course, make CRB handle the beverages.

- - > U P D A T E < - -

CRB has come through with the goods! It was a Duc de Séviac (which Britons can acquire via the web, but we Statesiders cannot) from Condom, France. Kudos to Condom!

DRM Killed The Radio Star (Reblog)

The PERFORM Act, wet dream of the RIAA, has risen from the dead thanks in part to some of my least-favorite democratic senators, Biden (perhaps our next President) and Feinstein. Yes, 2 of the 19 members of Congress who on July 25, 2002 sent a letter to Attorney General John Ashcroft urging that the Justice Department "vigilantly enforce intellectual property laws on the Internet to punish online theft of our copyrighted works."

The bill includes many gems, such as the government stepping in and forcing media providers to pay money to our media consortia, who are incapable of looking out for themselves and have no tools to defend themselves against evil consumer masterminds. It is a knife in the back of the Audio Home Recording Act of 1992. Progress!

Illinoisans, share your thoughts on this with Dicky-boy (who supported the interests of the Information Technology Industry Council 58% of the time in 2003-2004) and Obama.

What Passes For Education (Reblog)

According to the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, a parent who believes the earth is 14,000 years old has gotten An Inconvenient Truth removed from school screening. Jesus wept.

So "...any teachers who have shown the film must now present an 'opposing view.'"

The way our nation's education system is going, I find it hard to believe that we aren't already offering as a credible alternative to God creating everything in 7 days the theta explosion of Dianetics.

Über Alles

A reader in Germany writes:

---

I hate you [sic] blog software. It auto-detects the IP I am coming from and then auto-translates everything to German. It gives me no options to change this. Here is an example:

KRM

• Standort: Chicagoland : IL : Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika

Über mich

Another Luddite who has spent the best years of his life tilling the ol' computer fields. In his 'crepitude, his solace is the ancient art of the blog.

Blogs

	Blog-Name	Teammitglieder
	Itty Bitty Kitty Committee

---

I don't know about you, but I find this to be totally awesome. (Sorry EJB!)

Men Can Never Be Too Fat (Reblog)

While reading an article on the potential application of mindfulness to eating disorders, I was struck by its focus on eating disorders as a woman's issue. No explanation is given in the article as to why it is focused on "women who binged" and why this research isn't gender-neutral. In fact, the discussion sounds like it could apply to anyone once you remove unnecessarily weighted language about those "emotions" (that I hear women have) and suchlike. The article even links to more issues related to gender difference.

May I simply ask, WTF?

Let's Eat The Have-Nots (Reblog)

Anyone else think our Gini coefficient is going to hit 0.5 by 2010? Once we leave aside issues of education and religion -- oh, and how my tax money is routinely used to kill other people by my government -- this is my greatest source of despair as an American.

Leatherwing Bat

I collect versions of Leatherwing Bat. The first version of the song I heard was by Peter, Paul & Mary, but that's not a turn-off for me. There are lots of other versions, though, including well-known recordings by Bill Staines and Pete Seeger.

Unfortunately many of them are hard to get hold of. Still, every once in a while I stumble across a little freebie -- thanks, Cormorant's Fancy! While their version is a little too mellow and newagey for my tastes, it is still quite welcome.

I have a dream. A dream where Kate Bush voices a punkish version of the song. Maybe she'll show up for one of my birthdays!

Until then I must content myself with versions from...
Tom Banjo
Ingrid Karklins
The Poor Clares (or Re Mor)
The Muses
Hey Mom!
Judy Collins
Anne Dodson
Kevin Roth
Tommy Makem

(These aren't traditional lyrics, but they fit the tune. :-)

'Dolon-boy (Pets)

Around Thanksgiving this year Natalie and I adopted Maya's successor. The name El Pretensioso For Life gave him is Eidolon, but to keep jocks from throwing eggs at us when we walk him we generally call him 'Dolon. I have shiny pictures!

A Great Sticky Webcomic (Recommendation)

If you're not reading xkcd you're missing out on some seriously funny, mathy stick figures. And unlike my other stick paramours, you don't have to be a loser gamer to canoodle with these.

(I think my stick figure fascination goes back to Matt Feazell's Cynicalman, which NDJ introduced me to in the pages of Zot! in the way way long ago days. Zot! is itself most notable as a segue into the more broadly readable work of Scott McCloud, the excellent Understanding Comics.)

The Spurned Strike Back (Reblog)

Ever wanted to warn people about your exes? I'm sure your warnings would be as unbiased as mine would be! It is trustworthy people like us who are needed to contribute to fine new website Don'tDateHimGirl.com -- but be warned, don't follow the link if your audio is on unless you're prepared for the whole room to listen to their video ad.

Save The Customer, Screw The Customer (Reblog)

Why does news always have to be so conflicting? Can't it ever just be about a glorious victory for the forces of unimpeded boob-tubing? Sununu is attempting, again, to crush the broadcast flag. We all hate the broadcast flag, yet another effort to force universal hardware support for corporate-philic DRM on the media that we clearly exist solely to steal.

Unfortunately, this nascent legislation would also curb the FCC's ability to regulate industry standards. If it had been in place, we might not be able to look forward to sticking a Comcast cable card in an arbitrary piece of television hardware, such as a cable box. The cable companies are certainly in need of much more outside governance than the FCC traditionally hands down to them, even with its current powers.

Google Sky (Reblog)

Apparently Google is going to be helping out with the data that will one day be gathered by the Large Synoptic Survey Telescope (LSST). They'll provide storage and design tools to search 30 terabytes of information on the hemisphere of our cosmos visible from Cerro Pachón in northern Chile. From half of the cosmos to tiny near-Earth objects, look for Google Sky to kick off sometime after the telescope is completed circa 2014.

Alas, Palestine (Recommendation)

I'd like to recommend President Jimmy Carter's new book, Peace Not Apartheid, to anybody interested in the incessant Palestinian conflict. Carter has taken a lot of flack for just the title, without even getting into the actual contents, but he is as even-handed in his treatment as President George W. Bush is in his handing out of economic favors to the corporate teats he suckles his evil from.

Dangle, brave from! Dangle!

Volition's Generosity

My wife, who makes a habit of spying on me, told me that I was profiled on some gaming web site. Well, it looks like I got all of the profile I deserve. I never checked out the title to see if I got in the credits; I admit I had hoped I'd somehow been forgotten, so that the only modern game with my name on it didn't end up being one based around a torture mini-game. Alas for karma!

I'd much rather be remembered for authoring the final two versions of Avatar on the NovaNET (nee PLATO) system with the illustrious JDH. Or even for Thumper on the same system.

I guess we can't always write our game-construction epitaph.

The Name Of The Blog

This is how my brain works.

1. My first impulse was to call this blog Forsan Et Haec Olim Meminisse Iuvabit.

2. Then, I thought, I might as well be calling it Le Pretentious Curmudgeon. I thought that had some cachet, and was going to go for it...

3. But alas lpc.blogspot.com was already taken. Loco Por Cuba!

4. With my brain firmly fixated on available initials, and my own IBKC hissing and spitting around my ankles, my blog was doomed to a strange name that conveys little meaning.

Hey!

Just like the posts in the blog itself!

Serendipity.

(There used to be, and perhaps still is, a restaurant in State College, Pennsylvania that used that Aeneid quote as their slogan, not realizing the context in which Vergil placed it. It can be hard to justify pretentiousness, but when it unknowingly skewers itself like that, it is all worthwhile.)

(Look for many such opportunities to appreciate ostentation giving itself its own comeuppance on my blog!)

Editing ~= Censorship (Reblog)

While the wiki can be a fine tool for sharing information in a relatively collegial environment, it is really vulnerable to those who wish its information ill. The Wikileaks folk are talking about an uncensorable wiki that will bring freedom of speech documents to the world.

Is this a sound concept? Is it even possible for uncensorable peanut butter to stick to the wiki bar? From where I sit, once you remove the emotional baggage from the word, censoring is actually a fundamental part of an evolving wiki. How can a communally-maintained work prevent any form of censorship?

I guess I don't understand how the wiki concept enters into the otherwise cogent goal of disseminating information which some powerful organizations don't want disseminated. It seems much further off target than some of the distributed file sharing systems that have tackled that problem, Freenet being one familiar example.

Of course some commentary at Cryptome indicates that Wikileaks may be more interested in shilling a product than actually building one. The architecture of that enterprise I can understand.

Slashdot seems to be nattering about this same topic.