Trying on other peoples' shoes

It's true: you can never really know what it's like for someone until you're (metaphorically) standing in their shoes.

Nothing says class like a nylon track suit and a tie

Feel free to replace the tie with a bolo or ascot.

Name/Job correlation?

My mother likes to joke that everyone in IT is named Dave. As it turns out, I've never worked with anyone named Dave. Not in IT, not outside of IT that I can remember.

However, I've found that working in the financial sector I'm currently working in the same office as 6 Michaels. There are a total of 7 in the company. Does working in finance attract people of a certain name? Are there other jobs that seem to attract more of one name than others?

Maybe there's just an over-abundance of Michaels in the area.

Feeling poor? Just convert a 5 dollar bill into Zimbabwe Dollars

Right now, the Zimbabwe Dollar is worth a whopping 0.00000000005353 USD. So go ahead and exchange some of your money, heck, even a penny, for millions of Zimbabwe Dollars!

And for some delightfully depressing reading, check out Dr. Gono's statement on the current state of monetary affairs in Zimbabwe. It makes you long for the Weimar Republic!

The (Really, Really) Dark Knight

I was going to write a long review of The Dark Knight, but since Michael Sragow already wrote it for me, here's a link.

For those who don't want to read the whole thing: it's a good film that's constantly dragged down by being too preachy and serious.

To note: This is not to suggest that the acting, cinematography, or directing was poor, just the script.

New York City?!

Get the rope.

Actually, get me stuff to do! I'm heading to NYC from July 24th-29th. I'll be hanging out with my sister some of the time, but during work hours on the weekdays I'll likely be on my own. I'm sure I'll go hit all the museums and such, but I want to hear about cool places to go and things to do that are rarely (if ever) in a guidebook.

Lay it on me, while I go get me some Texas salsa.

My perfect cup of coffee at work

I'll admit it: I'm cheap. If I can get free food, I'll take it. So if I have the choice between free hot coffee and pay-for cold soda, I'll take the coffee. The problem here is that I don't like hot coffee very much. I do, however, love iced coffee.

There are a few ways to make iced coffee, the easiest is to just drop a bunch of ice in a hot cup of joe and be done with it. This is terrible, unless you like weak, diluted coffee.

I take a long, drawn out route, but the results are exactly what I crave (and it's free). Here's how I do it:

1) Pour hot coffee into mug (I prefer less caffeine, so it's half decaf and half regular)
2) Add sugar to taste [optional]
3) Stir the heck out of the coffee while you work until it's cooled
4) Place mug into refrigerator until cold (10 minutes)
5) Place mug into freezer until really cold (5 minutes or so)
6) Enjoy!

Although the entire process takes over an hour (using a nice coffee mug hinders the cooling process a lot), what comes out at the end is a perfectly strong, ice cold cup of coffee.

So tell me, coffee drinkers, what laborious route do you take for your perfect cup of joe?

Yvonne's Original No Streaks Microfiber Cloth

I recently attended the Back To The 50's car show at the Minnesota State Fair grounds. At one of the vendor booths there was a simple product called "Yvonne's Original No Streaks Microfiber Cloth." They had a plain old window, a bucket of water, and one of their cloths. My father and I tested them. I even had the guy wipe my glasses with them. It appeared that the product worked! We were guaranteed that the product would live up to our expectations, or our money back.

I decided the best test would be on my bathroom mirror. It needed a little cleaning anyhow. I did a thorough cleaning with my trusty sponge. My mirror looked beautiful and streak-free. Then I did a very simple wipe with the cloth (lightly damp, as directed). My mirror looked exactly the same. I wasn't disappointed, but the fact that my sponge was just as good left me feeling like I'd been had.

But that was only part 1 of my experiment.

Part 2 involves the one thing that always kills a beautiful window: fog. Every time I clean my car, I'm always thrilled at the results...until it gets too humid out. Then I can't see anything but streaks. So to simulate this, I closed my bathroom door and started a hot shower. This is really where the truth comes out. My sponged side was the usual, broad, flat strokes of streaks. And Yvonne's Original No Streaks Microfiber Cloth?

Well, I guess you can't call them streaks. But the promise on the package of "spot free" isn't exactly accurate. The way water dries from the cloth wipe is in tiny little specks of water. Each and every one of these comes out when the glass gets foggy.

Was this better or worse then my sponge? That's a good question. Initially, the microfiber side looked like it wasn't even picking up the fog; it was amazing! The space between the specks was clean and clear. As the fog became more dense, the broad, flat streaks from the sponge became evenly covered in moisture, whereas the specks from the microfiber cloth stuck around. In the end, I was more easily able to see myself in the half of the mirror that the sponge had wiped.

The final verdict? Although these cloths are not pope-sanctioned miracles, they do provide ease of use and protection against minor fogging. I'd recommend them to anyone who is looking for a simple solution to cleaning glass, but doesn't need to polish camera lenses for a trip to the rainforest.

Update: I own a professional-grade CRT monitor that has a glass coating on it that's very delicate. This has always been very hard to clean properly, because you can't use anything but water, and even then you don't want to accidentally short the tube. Yvonne's cloth cleaned off all the fingerprints, left the coating intact, and a quick wipe with a cotton cloth made my monitor look like new. It was worth it right there.

Updates: Movies VS Games

When George Lucas re-released Star Wars, he replaced bad rubber puppets with fancy CGI, added more scenes, and changed others. This led to nerds around the world crying out in anger (much like Darth Vader in Ep III) because the movie from their childhood was modified and thus ruined.

This never happens to video games.

When a game is updated everyone is happy. In fact, most gamers want to see their favorite games updated for the next-gen consoles. Who doesn't want to see the flat, pixel-ridden Mario from Super Mario Bros. changed into a beautifully drawn cartoon Mario? Heck, add in some extra levels too. Why don't we toss in some new enemies while we're at it? As long as Nintendo kept what was good about it (the gameplay), so very few would ever be bothered by the update. And those that were bothered are probably content playing the original anyhow.

What is it that makes video games different? Why do we mourn the loss of our childhood when a movie we liked gets a fresh polish, but cheer when we see a new update come down the pipe for our favorite game?

Getting spun-up on piracy

Nothing gets me more frustrated than people sticking their fingers in their ears because it's easier to maintain the status quo than to admit they might be wrong and change something. Today's frustration comes from the video gaming industry.

This here is a long-winded article discussing why PC game piracy isn't the real problem. Please take the time to read it. Maybe someone with some clout in the industry will read it and take a stand. If nothing else, perhaps it will help garner enough support in the general populous to get some positive changes made.

Quasihemidemisemiquaver

Let us welcome the 128th note's full name into our vocabularies. "Billy, do play this group of sixteen quasihemidemisemiquavers; it sounds lovely."

Two heads are better than one

When two people are paired correctly, pair programming works beautifully. There's always that second set of eyes, The Nodding Dummy, sitting right there with you, ensuring that your stupid, little mistakes are fixed as you write the code.

As opposed to later, when you're busy tearing your hair out, and praying you don't get fired for incompetency.

Movin' on, uh over, to the, uh, west side...

Well, I'm not quite moving up, nor am I moving east, but I've moved. Or at least my stuff has moved. I'm still settling in ( read: unpacking).

Thanks to all my friends who helped me load and unload and haul furniture, I owe ya one (or two).

Sending a mixed security signal

I have recently experienced what some might say is a gross security oversight. At a certain company every employee is required to lock all company data in their drawers before leaving for the night. This is obviously to prevent easy theft of non-public material data. There is nothing wrong with this practice.

However, this same company has no policy regarding its paper trash. Most people toss their old printouts in the trash or recycle bin. Yes, those who work with highly sensitive data do shred their printouts. However, the majority of the employees have had little to no security training, and not having a policy regarding sensitive printouts sends a very mixed message about corporate security.

So listen up kids, don't so this, it just makes you vulnerable, and teaches poor security to your employees. Also, it makes security wonks cry. No one wants to see that.

Singing accents

Does anyone have a good explanation why some people sound like they're from elsewhere when they're singing? AC/DC never sounds Austrailian, Styx sounds British half the time.

Then again, no matter how hard the Scorpions try, they always sound like they're from Germany.

Like vultures to roadkill

Someone walked out of the conference room next door and said "there's wraps and stuff going to waste in there." First I thought, "no, surely someone must want them." So I waited, but the call of the vulture was too loud. So I asked my neighbor, "did he just say free food?" Upon agreement, we both carefully tiptoed our way over to the room. Like a pair of siblings sneaking downstairs to see what Santa brought, we maed our way to the food.

Lo and behold, there really were wraps! Greedily, we took our spoils and as we were leaving we saw that the news had already traveled far and wide; there were packs of hungry men making their way across the office in search of the fabled carrion.

As I sat at my desk nibbling on my food, I watched the men walk out with their portions, smiling, happy, victorious. Now I know how the vulture feels after devouring the carcass of some large rodent: a little gassy.

The hi-def update

It appears as though the format war may be coming to an end. HD-DVD looks like it's about to die, and Blu-Ray is still going strong (well, relatively anyway). It's not the side I would have liked to see win, but at least this silly war is nearly over. I just hope HD-DVD concedes Blu-Ray's win soon and allows us to finally get our hi-def on without worrying if it will be the wrong choice.

Ironically, things are not as clear-cut if you want to buy a hi-def TV. As it stands, there are leaps and bounds being made in both the image quality and the display size, as well as the display type. Currently we're seeing LCD and Plasma as what's hot, but OLED and SED are around too, and promise all sorts of good stuff. Even if you stuck with the current image leader, plasma, you'd still be best to hold off. Despite Pioneer creating what's been touted as the best TV ever, they've already shown us that they've got slimmer and better coming in a couple of years. If you're going to spend $6000 on a high-end TV, you'd like it to not be out-dated in 2 years. As far as CRTs go, we've hit the point where it's as good as it gets, I'm curious to see how long it takes for plasma to get there. ...You know, unless SED grows up.

The contractions are getting worse, doct'r

I just had an IM conversation in which the response to my request for confirmation was:
"Ok, I'll".

This is an amazing use of a contraction. Technically speaking, "I'll" means "I will". Saying "Ok, I will" is a perfectly acceptable response to my request, yet something seems so very wrong about using that contraction there.

Do I think he might do it again? I think he'll.

A corporate competition where everyone loses

I'll begin by saying that I'm a big supporter of the idea that competition between companies brings lower prices and greater innovation, giving the consumer better, cheaper products to choose from. However, this is not always the case.

The battle for a new high-definition video-disc format is killing everyone. The consumers lose because there are 2 incompatible formats that do pretty much the exact same thing for about the exact same price, except the title availability isn't the same. So if I flip a coin, and go with HD-DVD I lose out on all the Pixar films I love. If I decide to switch over to Blu-Ray, I'll miss out on Paramount and Dreamworks films. And even if I drop the huge amount of money on a quality player from each camp, I'm still stuck when it comes to heading over to my friends' house: what player do they have? I might as well buy the DVD version of everything and forget about all of this high-falutin' high-def stuff.

Now here's where the companies lose too. By not collaborating on one format, they lose customers who either choose the other format, or neither.

Personally, I'll be waiting, along with most of the world, for a winner. If that winner never comes, we'll either see both formats die and be replaced altogether, or we will see high-def combo players become standard (to note, this would be fine by me, just as long as they get cheap soon).

For the time being, no one's happy, and it's all because the big studios were too busy worrying about this piracy thing that they keep telling us is killing their profits, to see that a new unified format is the only way to rake in money like DVD did.

November is Hip Hop History Month

Now's the time to break out all your Run-DMC, Eric B & Rakim, KRS-ONE albums, and spin a James Brown break or two, all while poppin' and breakin' and watching your local graf crew bomb the city.

Let us all celebrate the four elements of hip hop this month...
1) Emceeing
2) DJing
3) Break dancing
4) Graffiti
...and remember those who have come before you.

Grab a copy of some of these fine documentaries: Style Wars, Freestyle, The Freshest Kids, Scratch

Bonus points for anyone who knows who that is in the picture, and why he's notable.