Month: April 2006

Just back from Vacation – Our new ship!!!!

Hi Everyone! We’re back from our vacation, and I just HAVE to tell you ALL about this new ship we’ve just bought! We JUST picked it up from the dealer out on at the Federation Navy Assembly Plant out on Eglennaert 1, Moon 14! It’s just FABOO! Here’s a quick picture of it while we were out taking our test flight!
ANYWAY, once we picked it up, we just HAD to go for a cruise. Oh! I almost forgot, didn’t even say what it was! It’s an, hang on, let me get the brochure and make sure I get it JUST right. Ah! It’s a… lessee… a “Gallente ‘Catalyst’ class Destroyer”! There’s a whole bunch of babble here about being ‘well suited for both skirmish warfare and fleet support’, and something about ‘anti-frigate platforms’, but we just HAD to get it because it has the most AMAZING wallpaper in it. You all just HAVE to come out and fly around with us! We’ll just take a quicky jaunt down to the Dairy Queen and be the ENVY of all the other ships!
Listen to me prattle on! Let me share some more pictures. Here’s a pic when we went out to watch the sunrise! There was this silly little machine in the way though, we had to go around it. Something about a ‘sedintary mum’ or a ‘gentry gun’ or something like that. But gosh, it was awkward! Durned near ran into the thing! Don’t know why they litter the space with them, someone should do something about it!
And speaking of annoyances! At one point, we flew by the Serpenti’s place, and wouldn’t you know it, they had parked their mining barge in front of our house again! We’ve told them and told them and told them that this is OUR space, and they have no right parking their big ole smelly barge near us! We paid good money for this space, and they should stay in their own area! Well, the last time this happened, we told them we’d show them what for! So little Bobbie got out the manual – you know, he’s SUCH a smart boy! And then we heard this big booming noise! Well wouldn’t you know it, Bobbie unloaded a couple railgun charges right into the Serpenti’s garage! We always knew he’d do well!
Anyway, we’re off to the movies now. This puppy’ll sure turn heads when we pull into the drive in, that’s for sure! Tah tah for now!

Today in the Book of Why

Friendzzzz, open our K&R to page 32, psalm 12. Today we shall recite from the Book of Why, wherein all manner of faults in life are exposed for cleansing…

Let us begin…

  • Why… did my MythTV primary volume kick the bucket just at the point where I’m ready to start working on some code to interract with it? We thank the powers at Maxtor for not taking the half a terabyte of other storage with it during it’s death throws. Amen.
  • Why… does the Linux kernel decide to number ethernet ports, particularly wireless ethernet ports, in a totally arbitrary way? Booting up may provide us with the mysteries of eth1, or perhaps today it’s eth2, or even something like eth1_someoddtext. Amen.
  • Why… is the Eclipse WTP project, such an awesomely wonderful and fantastic environment, be occasionally revealing itself as ‘not -quite- 100% stable’, particularly when I’m in the middle of convincing a client to use it? Amen.
  • Why… does the Bluetooth stack on the Treo 650 suck so bad? Simple requests for OBEX services cause the phone to crash and reboot. Connections to it are spotty at best, and it offers NO services up to a remote requestor. Makes it very hard to say “Please get my photos off my phone.” It is safe to note that almost every other Bluetooth phone on the market today at least provides a Bluetooth FTP service. The Treo doesn’t even have decency to say “no services”, it simply drops the connection. Amen, dammit.
  • Why… is there no easy way to hit the Tab key in Firefox in a textarea, and have it generate a Tab? Amen.

We shall ponder these life puzzles as we ommm around the coffeemaker and await enlightenment via it’s gurgly goodness.

And now, a word from the grocery store bagger girl…

In random clickingness, I came across ‘the best of craigslist‘, which offered up this particular rant from a grocery bagging girl in Portland…
A choice tidbit…

Paper or plastic- it’s not a difficult decision. Choose quickly, and please for the love of all that is good, do not change your mind mid-bagging. Not only is it a huge pain for me, but inconveniences others waiting in line.

Edit: Be sure to check Sinners in the Hands of an Angry Craig.

A tragic day! NOT!

As announced via the Washington Post :

Rep. Tom DeLay (R-Tex.), a primary architect of the House Republican majority who became one of the most powerful and feared leaders in Washington, told House allies last night he will step down from the House rather than face a reelection fight that appears increasingly unwinnable.

Okay, everyone together now. “Awwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww!!!!!”

Google Local Maps – but not for Palm

Glen Daniels write a post about Google Local Maps, a mapping service for ‘smartphones’. I was fairly excited about the prospect, until I realized that said service is only available for platforms that support the J2ME environment, as well as Blackberry devices.
Not Palm.
I’m blown away by this, but I suppose it’s another stake in the heart of the Palm platform. J2ME is ancient technology, has been around since the dawn of virtual machines. Why doesn’t the Treo have support for it natively? The newer ‘smartphones’ are getting more functionality, more applications, and better support than established and IMHO more useful platforms such as the palm.
Convergence my ass.
Edit 4/3/06 – A small update, the J2ME MID library is available for the Treo, but folks are having mixed success. I’m apparently not the only one disappointed in the lack of Treo support.