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Journo Dotage
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February 25th 2003 21:30EST
I'm in my old stomping ground in Headingley. I know who I'm with and I know where I'm going, but it's a general knowledge without specific directions. I know which direction to walk but there is a complication; I know I need cigarettes.
If I backtrack slightly, I know the shop on the corner will sell me a couple of loose cigs. This shop shouldn't be here. It should be over fifty miles away in a different life. But it is here, so I'll buy some cigarettes, maybe even a full pack if I have enough cash.
In order to arrive at that run down building where I used to work, I know I need to take that fork right and then step left and right through the terraced houses to the cricket ground and then turn right, pass the train station and I'll be there. I don't remember there being a motorway here but it's been years since I had to do this so I'm not phased.
It doesn't strike me as odd that the motorway has signs telling the world that mobile phone signals are not working in this area. I implicitly understand why; they need the bandwidth for military communications. It's just another one of those technology extensions that don't seem too much of a great leap to me.
As soon as I've read the signs and drawn my conclusions, they're confirmed by a military helicopter streaking down the side of the road, parallel with the train tracks, low, arched and angry. The bird seems to echo but the echo is a second, higher helicopter. The higher machine is obviously scouting; why else would it be that high?
The mayhem has caused panic and people are running. The sound of clinical machines watching, guarding, defending and selectively striking targets in my immediate vicinity has apparently made people take leave of their senses. They're running into pubs, into stores and even into the shop that has my displaced cigarettes. Fools.
I round the corner and notice the derelict building, clothed in iron spikes and barbed wire. It's been here for years, unloved and unattended. I wonder whether anyone has the padlock that would unlock those gates and whether it is possible to extract the lorry that has been in the open garage so long that it appears to have fused with the building, green moss spewing from the garage roof and grass sucking the lump of metal down. It's not strange that this building and its decrepit occupant are also out of place but the ironmongery should be there; of that I'm certain.
The grotesque beauty of the condemned is lost for a moment as something hits disharmony in the aural frenzy. The musical beat of rotors seems to have sounded an unintentional dischord. The streams of assault aircraft are still pouring along between the road and the rail so all is good there. But higher up, I can see the scout bird. I've seen no incoming fire yet I know it is wounded. The rotors are slowing and the body is starting to rotate. It's coming down.
The dying bird is directly above me and losing altitude quickly. I surprise myself by carefully assessing whether I can survive or not. Tons of metal are spiralling towards me and I know I can't escape no matter how quickly my older legs and polluted lungs want to, so I'll watch this elegant piece of nature fall until it takes me with it to a state of irrepair.
I don't know who else is coming with me and the bird, and it seems of little consequence. I can detect motion in my peripheral vision, maybe even petrified screams above the noise of the stalled engine.
The bird is getting bigger and bigger. I am resigned, but at the last moment, worlds shift and the helicopter is sliced sideways away from the rail tracks and into the abandoned masterpiece. I wait for the explosion, not even aware that I've just been spared. As the first rotor chops the slate tiles...
ONE OF THE BASTARD DOGS LICKS MY FACE FROM THE SIDE OF THE BED, THE BABY CRIES AND I'M LEFT WITH WHAT COULD HAVE BEEN ONE OF THE SINGLE MOST FANTASTICALLY VIVID DREAMS I HAVE EVER HAD. AND I'M SURE IT MEANT SOMETHING.
Comments ()
February 23rd 2003 22:25CST
Grammys a complete let down
It's well known that I'm not really up on popular culture so I thought it would make a nice Sunday evening to sit down with the kids and watch something that they cared about. As any good parent knows, coping strategies are needed for such tedium, so I thought I'd add a bit of wholesome family fun to the proceedings. I asked Sam to bring me a pen and paper so we could document any show business pseudo-politicians. She really liked the 'weasel watch' game as Natzoid screamed "fascist" at me; truth be told, I was looking for any reference not just anti-war references. So here is the list of woefully unsubstantiated accusations:
Other notable events/discoveries:
Anyway, two things stand out this evening.
Back to being left of center tomorrow. I know the kids will grow up well rounded with such beautifully crafted political exercises to fill their Sunday evenings. And I'm not even going to comment on Gwen Stefani's camouflage trousers...definite weasel.
Comments ()February 23rd 2003 18:10CST
Will the real Kenny please stand up?
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February 23rd 2003 13:10CST
Regardless of whether a potential war against Iraq is right or wrong, I really don't care what Sheryl Crow, George Clooney (whoever he is) or George Michael think about it. In fact, the whole of the 'celebrity' circuit should just shut the feck up about it. Being a musician or actor provides no grounding for voicing political opinions. I'm half tempted to watch the awards tonight so I can help update Aaron the Liberal Slayer's list of weasels.
Comments ()February 22nd 2003 19:00CST
OK, Techie question for you all
I've done a bit of housekeeping of the MySQL database that tracks my statistics. Basically, I archived the current set of records using myqldump and then from mysql:
delete from stats where blogid="whatever"
Having started recording again after the delete, when I do:
select * from stats where blogid="whatever"
Logic would say that the db would either append after the last record or use up 'empty' slots from the start of the table, but it's not doing that. Why?
Answers on a postcard please.
Comments ()February 22nd 2003 11:30CST
Last night the Bean drew me a picture. It was "a strawberry muffin in the sea next to lawnmower mountain with daddy as a spider" and I knew exactly where she was coming from. I had a hard week too.
She is, for want of a better phrase, hell on wheels at the moment. During the course of this week she has:
If you meet the Bean, be afraid. Be very afraid. That strawberry muffin in the sea is there for a purpose. Lawnmower mountain is lethal and she can turn you into a spider, just like she did me, with a marker, some talc and a few eggshells.
Comments ()February 20th 2003 21:30CST
There are special rays of orange light that flood our kitchen and living room at dawn during the Spring and Summer. I saw them this morning. At least I saw a great impersonation of them. There may be eight weeks of Tundra left but those rays of orange light are hope, and they are beautiful.
Comments ()February 19th 2003 18:55CST
I read Natzoid's post from the early hours of this morning at around 06:00. While a little confused as to whom it was aimed at, by the time 10:00 came around, I had come to the conclusion that after I had said goodnight last night, I must have had some kind of somnambulistic episode which resulted in some form of jihad being launched upon me.
So, at work my mind was working overtime. The anger in that post had me thinking all kinds of panic stricken thoughts. "Oh my God, I've done something so bad that Natzoid is willing to publicly shoot me the bird. What the hell am I going to do now? I'll be twice divorced before the age of 34 and living in a foreign country with kids either side of the Atlantic."
I was surprised when, at about 13:00, Natzoid IM'd me full of the joys of life. I must confess I was a little hesitant to respond, still convinced that she was in the process of packing the van, leaving the dogs and heading off to some French guy's pad, stopping off at my work only to either rip me a new one or empty a revolver into my head. It transpires that I was not the cause of her wrath, but some vacuous airhead who has taken to visiting her blog and leaving some fairly nasty and nefarious comments.
The whole experience left me contemplating how much the blogging community echoes reality; a predominantly nice bunch of people with the odd dickhead thrown in for good measure. The only difference is the synthetic shield that the internet offers the cowardly. Whoever assaults others for the contents of their blog is quite obviously a lowlife. I, personally, like many different styles of blog. I like seeing real people getting on with real life and their everyday ups and downs - it's therapy. I like commentary, I like comedy. It's a wonderful mix of hundreds of thousands of channels to watch and unlike cable, there's always something of interest on.
So, to the protagonist comment hawks, I say feck off and put in a video. We neither need nor value your presence in any way.
Comments ()February 17th 2003 09:00CST
I drove to work in a car with heat. A novelty of the first order. Not only did it have heat, it didn't squeak and the brakes functioned. It doesn't get much better than this.
Comments ()February 16th 2003 18:45CST
The joy of coding. A lost weekend.
Having lost a weekend to coding, I can safely say that I feel totally ungratified. Scarlet now exists in two forms; a functional piece of software that looks like someone took a bunch of HTML constructs and threw them at vi, and a beautiful piece of software that is dazzling in its radiance, but allows you to accomplish precisely one task.
I am now of the opinion that I have enough style and substance (albeit in separate packages) to convince anyone that I have the capability to produce a fairly good product so I should focus on a business plan to raise some venture capital rather than continue coding ad infinitum. My ball-park numbers say that in order to have a product ready to go, I'll need half a million dollars and between six and nine months to code. If I could find someone stupid with enough vision and cash, I'd hire one person and voila, look out Larry Ellison.
Anyway, enough about Scarlet and the mind games.
Happy Birthday Kenny's Grandma
Tomorrow is my grandmother's 77th birthday. Born in Czechoslovakia, older sister to Hans and Helena, she was fobbed off to live with her Aunt in Austria after her parents decided she was the easiest of the kids so someone else could raise her. She lived there during the rise of the Nazis, through the war and ended up marrying my grandfather, who was a soldier in the British army fighting in Austria. There my mother was born.
My grandfather lured her back to the UK with assurances that it was a great place to be, so she moved from a beautiful village just outside of Vienna to the dizzyingly ugly town of Wigan. They couldn't afford a house of their own so they moved in with my grandfather's mother. Predictably, the family turned on my grandmother with all the pathos they had due to her being of Germanic descent. In the early 1950s, my grandfather managed to qualify for a council house (due to his pitiful wage as a coal miner) and they moved into the house that she still lives in today.
Work has been done on the house, some by the council, some by my father, some by me. My mother has offered to buy her a house but she won't allow that. So she continues to rent her council house, over half a century after she moved there. Just her and her guide dog. She takes yearly trips back to Austria to see her sister and family, monthly trips to the hospital to monitor her eyes, weekly trips to my parents' for Sunday dinner and twice a week, she catches a bus into Ashton to do her grocery shopping. The pilgrimage to Ashton market has gone on for more years than I have been alive.
Her mind is still sharper than a tack, her wit pithy and her demeanor just as stoic (and maybe bombastic) as it ever has been. That is why she can still make it to the market twice a week. She's an incredible lady. Happy Birthday Grandma. Even though you'll probably never read this. They broke the mold when they made you.
Comments ()February 15th 2003 16:15CST
As you may have noticed from Natzoid's post frequency today, she didn't head to Illinois due to some weather conditions that, quite frankly, make me think the big guy upstairs is pissed with the Midwest. None the less, I have been given the weekend to work on Scarlet. Previously, Scarlet lived on yatescentral.com, where there is a limit of 10 SQL databases. Looking at the whole project holistically, I knew that doing the work on a remote machine was a bad idea, so I set about ensuring that my local Linux box (teapot) was running all the appropriate software (SSL, PHP, MySQL) and that I could archive data from yatescentral to import onto teapot. The latter task took me all of 20 minutes to do. The former has taken me roughly eight hours.
Now that I'm up and running locally, I can start doing some of the purported hard work. Sigh. It's always the easy stuff that takes the time.
Meanwhile, back in real life, the Bravada has just cost us $450 to fix with an outstanding rear brake job that will cost $350 which leads me to believe, when you factor in the trouble with teapot's configuration, that the big guy is not only pissed with the Midwest, but that he's slowly but surely focussing on a little peasant whose dwelling is in the suburbs of Northwest Minneapolis, Tundra, MN.
In the immortal words of Father Jack, "Arse and Feck."
Comments ()February 13th 2003 18:50CST
Natzoid is leaving for Illinois again tomorrow. This means I have some time to work and, in reality, means I'll be pondering and posting trifles all weekend so I'll apologize in advance for the content.
I'm planning on sitting down and learning some extra MySQL administrative skills and rewriting a prototype piece of software that I knocked up in a couple of days a while ago. There is something tremendously satisfying about knocking up a proof of concept but because my mind flits from discipline to discipline, I find it hard to knuckle down and focus on writing code. The upside is that re-engineering something, having discovered what you missed in a prototype, is a learning experience that will allow you never to make those same mistakes again. The downside is that the fun of solving a problem has gone, and it's just labor.
Half of me doubts whether the project I'm going to be working on is worth anything. After all, if I can write it solo (which I wouldn't), then anyone with an IQ above a salmon surely would be able to write it in a timely and better designed fashion. That said, I'm going to knuckle down and work. I've learned and thought a lot since the first incarnation of what I will now codename 'Scarlet'. Its scope keeps expanding and my imagination runs riot as to how to make it extensible into other areas. Unfortunately, the extension is what causes the difficulty in maintaining discipline. Too many ideas and not enough fingers.
I've shown Scarlet to about five people in total and they have either been very enthused about its potential or have been cruelly polite and indulged me, not wanting to hurt my entrepreneurial feelings. Truth be told, I have no mind for accounting or, to be honest, coding the whole damn thing because deep down inside, I'm a marketing control freak with delusions of grandeur. If anything ever came of this, I'd want the marketing job, not the CEO or CTO (leave that to those that can do that kind of thing).
I've been spoiled in my working life. I know about 10 really talented entrepreneurs (who are all millionaires) that I have worked with. Their enthusiasm has rubbed off me from the first day I met one of them, so much so that I sometimes think that dedication can sometimes mitigate a lack of talent. We'll see.
Anyway, that's my weekend. I hope your weekend is a tad more thrilling.
Comments ()February 13th 2003 07:05CST
I have sat on the fence for a while now and am starting to list. If this is proven to be true, then I'm afraid I will do more than list.
Comments ()February 12th 2003 13:45CST
Paranoia is another gift that keeps on giving
Nothing is more disconcerting than examining one's very personal refer logs to find that there are explicit searches for one's name and blog. Either my infamy is growing or, more likely, someone's after me. And they're in Canada. Help. I don't think I know anyone in Canada, do I?
Please, if you visit from Canada, put my mind at ease and leave a comment letting me know that I have no need to be afraid of you and that you are just a peace-loving being who has no intentions of monitoring this blog to find out where I'll be at any given point so you can axe/shoot/hang me. Thank you my kind Canadian neighbors.
I'm off to hide in my cube until I see a white flag and "we come in peace" comment.
Comments ()February 11th 2003 07:00CST
They say that the average snowfall for a season in Minnesota is 56 inches. I have always wondered what season that was.
I've had enough of these -20 degrees C days now. What novelty there was very quickly wore off. Tonight, I have the unenviable task of changing a flat tire (on the van) in these temperatures. This is room 101; metal in sub-zero temperatures and holding the pressurized air nozzle as you inflate tires.
Comments ()February 10th 2003 19:00CST
Behold the new locally hosted comments courtesy of John (I owe you a pint next time I'm in the UK). No more will ye have to suffer Yaccs.
Comments ()February 9th 2003 18:45CST
Name 'em and shame 'em
The following domains are being told to 403-off for either not playing fair, assaulting my poor little blog or stalking me:
stlsmo.swbell.net
4.38.68.167
pa-x.dec.com -- didn't DEC die when Compaq bought them?
216.123.180.228
206.98.140.182
usdist-560-02.teletech.com
whtmrs01.md.comcast.net
uk.uudial.com -- sorry parental units, not something one dude should do to another dude.
202.130.245 -- the irony, me blocking Chinese access. I kill myself.
argon.oxeo.com
66.180.110.196
24.69.55.147
ncsa.uiuc.edu
195.188.243 -- Wigan MBC, you know who you are.
I know a certain little IBM subdomain that may be heading in the same direction. And just for the record, I will be ditching Yaccs comments either by some code donated by John or I will write my own commenting system because, people, Yaccs sucks.
February 9th 2003 11:15CST
OK, so here's the deal. Marketing companies would pay handsomely for this information but I offer this to you for naught.
I don't have the desire or ability to deal with the day to day economics of running a house so I long since handed over the mantle to Natzoid. I get paid and Natzoid distributes the monies to wherever they need to be. For all I know, they could be hived off into an offshore bank account in the name of Noodles, in preparation for a future abscondment with a French internet addict of dubious parentage (and by that I mean French). Natzoid deals with insurance brokers, mortgage people etc etc. So, in short, if you're trying to sell something, don't try to sell it to me because I don't have (or want) any say in what we buy.
The point of the above is that I'm worrying that we may be short of cash or that the offshore account is getting more attention and love than it deserves. The reason for this suspicion is that the house is starting to collect an inordinate amount of candles. It started off with a few breast cancer candles and has been slowly gathering momentum. In the last three shopping trips Natzoid has taken, the amount of candles that she has returned with each time has increased exponentially. We are now at the point that when I arrive home from work, I can't decide whether to take off my coat and boots, and switch on the news or drop to my knees and start performing some freaky-deaky religious rite. Incidentally, I swear I saw the Virgin Mary in my tea this morning, and it's Sunday; I'd take that as a message but for the fact that Wolf Blitzer was in yesterday's tea.
Anyway, the candles are a matter of grave concern to me. Is this Natzoid's symbolic way of telling me that she's not paid the electricity bill? If it is, she'd better figure out how we can run the computers on something freely available, like dog poop and snow (I feel an experiment coming on). The deranged mathematical part of my mind says that somehow, if we stopped buying candles in wholesale quantities, we may be able to pay the electricity bill and life would once again return to normal. Oh, and there would be more money left over to be put into the sordid "help Natzoid escape domestic hell and flee to a stinky country house in Southern France with Pierre Le Grand Fromage" fund. Just remember Natzoid, they speak French in France, are well known for their dislike of Americans and they don't have the luxury of 24-hour candle convenience stores. Also remember, they also have to pay their electricity bills, just like everyone else.
I feel compelled to close this on a very emphatic 'closure' kind of note so I will.
So there.
February 8th 2003 12:30CST
Working Man Falls Asleep on Sofa
Minneapolis MN -- yateswire -- Reports are coming in that a Man fell asleep on his sofa late on Friday evening. The Man in question allegedly works full time and had experienced a particularly intense couple of days. At this time, there are no reports of casualties although speculation as to the cause of the unconsciousness may lead to some.
Interviewed by a yateswire representative the Man commented "I have no comments other than to say, 'Yes - I fell asleep'."
About yateswire: yateswire is a fully owned subsiduary of yatescentral dedicated to the endless pursuit of The Truth(TM).
Safe Harbor Statement: yatescentral has various business relationships with pickle juice but cannot attest to the accuracy of statements made therein and, at times, may completely disagree with the outrageous fiction that occasionally spills forth.
Peace out.
February 5th 2003 18:50CST
It's fair to say that I haven't exactly been on top of my game today. Having been out for dinner to celebrate Natzoid's birthday last night, I had one too many vino collapsos. I had a short presentation to give to the senior management this morning and it seemed like my neurons were dripping down a 4800 baud line rather than the usual T1 where I can't keep up with the stream.
I've had a few emails over the last couple of days from an old friend of mine in England. From an early age, he had been identified as having a phenomenal intellect and despite his attempts to dampen the vivid consciousness that troubled him, he has been extremely successful in his chosen arena, taking on Oxford and Cambridge academics. It's sad that pretty much the only time we communicate is when his reality is getting the better of him and he's at his lowest. It's sad and frustrating. My brother has long since given up on him as has Natzoid to a certain extent, but I can't; we've been friends over half my life and been down in the gutter together on more than one occasion and we've dreamed together. We spent nights dreaming of projects to do that in hindsight other people have done and made a lot of cash from them (I'm famous for having fantastic ideas and letting other people make fortunes out of them years later). We also spent nights looking at the bottom of empty pint glasses only to walk outside and be immediately beaten by the great unwashed. Some friends become family and no matter what their flaws, you can't dump them. This friend has seen me through more turmoil than I can even remember, questioned my reasoning on several occasions and then pulled through for me. There are few people in this world to whom I can give that accolade, which is the primary reason that I cannot ignore him.
His neural pipe is a fiber optic backbone and his problems are akin to denial of service attacks. His response is to try to reduce the available bandwidth in the time honored English way and it succeeds with side-effects. We used to joke about 'losing the tenuous grip on the thing that we never had a really good grip on in the first place' and we knew exactly what we meant. I, although being nowhere near as intelligent as he, know a smaller part of that feeling every now and again and, yes, I want to shut down too when that happens. The difference is that I can't get away professionally with what he can; I don't have the substance.
So when I get emails with salient prose and poetry, I remember the extent of the intellect involved and know that I cannot process them in a manner that reflects his circumstance. In fact, I told him "This is either something really deep or you're telling me you want to roll a seven; either way stop it."
I'm pretty sure that he doesn't know of the existence of this little blogaroo. In the same way I sometimes struggle, I wish he could but I know he won't. He's either 'on' or 'off' and that's what nature dealt him. I need to respect that and do what he has done for me on many occasions; be there as a shoulder to cry on when everyone else thinks he's lost it. I'll question his logic just like he has questioned mine, but ultimately, he's got one guy on his side no matter what, even if I am 4500 miles away.
G, if you find this, be sure I will deny it to your face and know that I think you're a wart of the first order and if you had a slightly higher IQ, you'd be a plant. :)
February 3rd 2003 07:45CST
I have no idea how to use my snow-blower but I'm sure I need to learn and quickly. I can just about see the top of our mail box. Feck.
February 2nd 2003 15:55CST
I've just done a quick run down to Target. I set out on the mission with three things to do, two for Natzoid and one for me. That list comprised getting a Sunday paper, a Beck CD and some Shake'N'Vac or whatever its American equivalent is (the wiff'o'dog is getting a bit strong).
I achieved none of the above. However I did return with the following:
As I brought the stuff into the house, Natzoid's expression looked perplexed then despairing. Stepping away she muttered "All you need to add to that is a nice [single] bottle of Chardonnay."
In order to prove my masculinity, when she gets back from Rainbow I am going to drink a full pint of Guinness in under 5 seconds and then belch for 5 seconds.
February 1st 2003 14:45CST
Woke up in bad mood to jubilant dogs wanting to go outside and kids screaming from a bedroom. Drank cup of tea while reading about missing space shuttle. Went to deposit pound sterling check into sadly lacking bank account; teller first tried to deposit the amount in dollars and then tried to give me cash for the check. Came home and veg'd while watching CNN's coverage of the shuttle. Discovered am cold; decided bath is in order to warm up. Ran bath. Realized no bubble-bath. Put left foot in bath. Left foot emits scream much like lobster entering pot. Ran cold water. Put right foot in bath. Right foot screams. Fiddled with CD player for a couple of minutes while trying to figure out how to program certain tracks. Gave up. Got in bath. Veg'd. Got out. Put on jeans. Jeans hurt due to scalded feet. Wife and youngest kid absent without leave.
Still in bad mood. Need cat to kick.
By the way, has anyone else ever noticed that anything that involves Israel in any way, shape or form usually ends up in a complete clusterf**k?