Tikkabik

There's an interesting article in Sunday's New York Times Style section about the trend of adults who share the interests of their kids. Given that I'm as inclined to play video games as Bob is and that Bonnie and Emme both share a profound love Hello Kitty, this is something we're quite cognizant of in our house, even if we didn't put a name on it.

As it turns out, according the article, it's a widespread enough phenomenon that it's something that has attracted the attention of marketing executives and sociologists alike. The Madison Ave. set has coined terms like "rejuveniles" and "kidults" to pithily identify this group of consumers.

Leave it to the tweed-jacket contingent to take the piss out of this trend. One sociology professor from the U.K., Frank Furedi (his name is misspelled in the article), calls this a new wave of infantilism, and said, "Today, the way you demonstrate your worth is the extent to which you still go to rock concerts, you're still groovy, you're still a player."

I think that's Furedi's observation may be colored by his academic focus: From what I could find on the Web, his specialty is examining factors in social anxiety. So of course, Furedi is going to observe this trend from a negative perspective. From where I sit, it's got nothing to do with a need for validation in a youth-oriented culture, and I couldn't care less about being "groovy." I feel no guilt or shame in admitting that I like many of the same things I did when I was eighteen. I feel no guilt or shame in admitting that I dislike many of the things I liked when I was eighteen, too.

I don't see anything wrong with 20 and 30-somethings sharing the interests of kids, as long as they're realistic about it: Eventually those kids -- mine too -- are going to become teenagers, and at that point, it's going to be uncool to do or to say anything your parents like.

The question I'm left with is, where will this leave my kids? I've got both ears pierced and I still fire up Tool and Bauhaus to room-shaking levels on a regular basis, and Bonnie and I shop at Hot Topic more often than not.

For our generation, a reaction against our ex-hippy parents spawned a brief era of neo-conservatism with preppies and yuppies suddenly "in." Family Ties' Alex P. Keaton -- Michael J. Fox's character -- may have been satirical, but there was a grain of truth in him too. I'm not saying that every kid my age in the 80s was like him -- lord knows I wasn't, but the fact was, our counterculture *was* to wear a tie and penny loafers, to a certain extent -- at least for a while.

So, with an ex-punker for a dad and an ex-Goth for a mom, what'll happen to our kids? I have visions of my children coming home one day in Elizabethan collars or something -- just trying to express their individuality.

Posted by flargh at 10:09 AM | Permalink | Comments (8)

SOBIG HAIKU, IN THREE PARTS

My Mac's e-mail fills
Like a stream swelling with rain
SoBig.F strikes

Details, movie, thanks
My rules filter has become
SoBig's dark shadow

All the servers lie,
'Your e-mails are infected!'
Windows software sucks.

Posted by flargh at 03:55 PM | Permalink

Grandma took all three kids off our hands last night; Bonnie and I woke up this morning to the glorious sound of silence. We woke up at a natural time this morning, without the pre-dawn shrieking and yelling ritual we've become accustomed to.

Bonnie was able to rest her coffee on the floor without worrying about someone coming by and kicking it over. I was able to go down to the kitchen without being assaulted with demands for cereal or bagels.

"Boarding school," I said to Bonnie, after a few moments of peace and quiet on the living room sofa. "Let's only let them home on the weekends and holidays."

Posted by flargh at 09:55 AM | Permalink

So some fat, antisocial teenaged idiot from a flyover state was able to copy a computer virus and modify it to infect at least 7,000 computers -- maybe "tens of thousands," according to one report.

And, by all accounts, this guy wasn't exactly the sharpest tool in the shed -- he modded an existing virus to wreak damage.

Imagine what a hacker who really knew what he was doing could do?

Buy a Mac.

Posted by flargh at 07:51 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Whoever made this up clearly has a supernatural ability, at least when it comes to knowing me.

Posted by flargh at 07:45 PM | Permalink

Friday Five.

1. Are you going to school this year?

Maybe PTA meetings, but that's about it.

2. If yes, where are you going (high school, college, etc.)? If no, when did you graduate?

1987. High school.

3. What are/were your favorite school subjects?

English. About the only thing in my life I've ever been good at.

4. What are/were your least favorite school subjects?

Math.

5. Have you ever had a favorite teacher? Why was he/she a favorite?

Probably my junior/senior year English teacher -- Mr. Gannon. He encouraged me to write, and always expressed enthusiasm for my short stories, no matter how disjointed and obnoxious they were.

Posted by flargh at 08:40 AM | Permalink

Here's my choice for California governor.

Posted by flargh at 08:23 AM | Permalink

Dear AT&T Wireless:

I've been a customer of yours for more than a year and a half. This December, I'll hit my two-year anniversary. Not coincidentally, that's the end of our contract -- I took a two-year contract because I ended up getting a fair number of rebates -- my phone ultimately cost me nothing and I netted $40 to boot. But unless things improve dramatically, I'm planning on leaving at the end of the contract, and I'll take my number with me, thanks to recent legislation.

See, I'm leaving, because your coverage sucks and your calling plans suck too.

At least five times in the last month I've been in and around the Upper Cape, trying to make phone calls -- Falmouth, Mashpee, and Barnstable, mainly -- and I've been subject to drop-outs, calls that won't connect at all, and connections that are so bad I can't understand the caller at all. In fact, a couple of times have been in what I would deem "emergency" situations when I absolutely *needed* to get a hold of someone.

I had high hopes when I first got my phone that I'd be able to get rid of my land-line all together. I figured that I'd use my cell phone all the time. I couldn't wait to upgrade my cell phone to a GSM model with Bluetooth so I could sync contact data on my computer, until your own salesman convinced me otherwise because your GSM coverage area in this region sucks even worse than the network I'm using now.

As it turns out, a lot of people who I've talked to that have AT&T phones think the service sucks. But a lot of people who use your competitors' services in the same areas you service -- Verizon and Cingular, for example -- don't share that opinion. That tells me it's your fault.

Oh, by the way, I would have called up your customer service number to complain directly, but I couldn't get a connection.

Posted by flargh at 05:47 PM | Permalink | Comments (18)

I wonder if these doctors are related to each other.

Posted by flargh at 04:27 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

...don't fart when you're swimming. You'll just make it worse.

Posted by flargh at 04:20 PM | Permalink

So my mom and I were just chatting about this guilty pleasure we both share: The new Fox television drama series, The O.C.

Having lived in Orange County, Calif., where the show is supposedly based, I guess I pine a bit for the environment -- we lived in Laguna Beach, which is one of the most beautiful spots on the Southern California coast, as far as I'm concerned. I'd see the Newport Beach crews buzzing around in their Ferraris and Porsches, Mercedes and (at the time, novel) Lexuses, kids not even as old as I was at the time (20) popping over to malls in their brand new convertible Audis, Corvettes and BMWs to spend absurd amounts of daddy's credit at South Coast Plaza or Fashion Island (known derisively by the alterna-crowd I hung out with as Fascist Island).

I never got to know anyone but one or two kids on the Newport scene anything but superficially, but enough of that lifestyle made an impression on me to make me supremely jealous of their glamorous, insulated life. I knew it was something I would either have to be born or married into, so I knew it would never happen for me. And for whatever reason, I'm delighted to see it put to the TV screen even if it's a melodrama.

Bonnie thinks it's cute that, as she puts it, I have my "own 90210." Bonnie watched Beverly Hills: 90210 from start to finish, and I ragged on her almost every week -- Dylan, Kelly, Brandon, Blah Blah Blah -- everyone slept with everyone else by the end of the run, and the plots had exhausted probability to the point that all that was missing was an alien invasion.

But Bonnie got caught up in the characters, the plots, the romances, the hijinks. Just like everyone needs a popcorn movie now and then, everyone needs a popcorn TV show too, and this is it for me.

By the way, I never once heard Orange County referred to as "The O.C." Either it's a new thing (as in, "new since the early 90s"), or it's a way for the show's producers to dodge a lawsuit from the folks who made the Colin Hanks/Jack Black movie "Orange County" a couple of years ago.

As I've explained to anyone who will listen, partly simply as a way to assuage myself of the guilt I feel at watching this stuff, I've rationalized *why* I like The O.C. as much as I do: Unlike 90210 or Dawson's Creek, it's not just about kids -- it's about the adults too. And all the characters are likeable or at the very least sympathetic -- except for one or two two-dimensional characters (like Summer, Marissa's superficial best friend) who are meant to be that way.

So there you have it. The O.C. Fox, Tuesday night, 9PM. Enjoy.

Posted by flargh at 02:57 PM | Permalink | Comments (7)

It was mentioned on the news last night that the United States is putting $1 billion a month into its continued operations in Iraq.

Let's put that into perspective: If that money was yours, you'd be making one billion dollars a month.

That's a lot of money.

Another trivia point was that current projections show that unchecked, the U.S. deficit alone will soon grow to $1.4 trillion -- that's about the gross national product of France.

Again, a veritable shitload.

Posted by flargh at 01:47 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

The only place on Earth where 100 meters make up a kilometer, according to Corey is also the reason why your e-mail account is being deluged with hundreds of bogus e-mails.

Posted by flargh at 01:15 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

I have found a kindred spirit in Brandon Shimoda.

Posted by flargh at 08:47 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Seems only fitting that I should point you to FoxNews.com to bring you up to speed on the Al Franken outcome.

Posted by flargh at 11:14 PM | Permalink

Bonnie had a simple question: What day does school start for Bob and Emme? I'm almost positive it's September 2nd, but just to be sure I figured I'd hit the official Web site for our town's school system.

Holy fucking shit, it's useless. Click the link. Find out for yourself. See how many times you count the "Under Construction" tags.

Posted by flargh at 06:46 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Here.

1. When was the last time you laughed?

About five minutes ago.

2. Who was the last person you had an argument with?

Either my wife or my boss. They both figure into arguments frequently.

3. Who was the last person you emailed?

Some reader who had a comment about an article I wrote for MacCentral.

4. When was the last time you bathed?

Yesterday at about 3:45PM. It was a T day. That's how I remember.

5. What was the last thing you ate?

A donut hole, about fifteen minutes ago.

Posted by flargh at 10:18 AM | Permalink

Tycho over at Penny Arcade speaks truth of the N-Gage from Nokia. It's a fucking piece of shit.

I played with one of these during a wine-and-cheese (actually, burritos-and-margaritas) thing at E3, and I was totally unimpressed.

Nokia, it can be argued, may make competent cell phones. But a game company they are not, their acquisition of Sega's online gaming group notwithstanding.

So, flashback to E3: As the mariachi band plays an out-of-tune version of Oye Como Va, the Nokia guy hands me an N-Gage, and I play with it for a few moments. It has a tiny color screen, and the graphics are jumpy and frame rates are inconsistent. I notice that there's no cartridge slot to change games. He pops the back off and removes the battery, showing me a card slot underneath.

Let me emphasize this to make sure you understand: In order to change games for the N-Gage, you have to remove the fucking battery. That's just SO convenient to do when you're on a bus or a subway train someplace, jowl to jowl with dozens of other commuters.

It's the mother of all bad design decisions, almost Microsoftian in its cluelessness about basic user friendliness. Not to mention that as a phone, the N-Gage is about as comfortable as holding a brick to the side of your head. It's shaped like a brick, for that matter.

What pissed me off the most was not that Nokia hasn't a fucking clue and that the N-Gage is destined to die the death of a thousand knives, which it totally deserves. It's that journos are fucking clueless.

Certainly, game journos get it. But general interest ones do not. As I'm staring skeptically at this thing and patiently explaining to the guy that my own Nokia 3360 is perfectly serviceable as a phone and my 10-year-old Game Gear plays games a shitload better than this crapbox, and asking rhetorically why, for the love of god, would I want something twice as big as my phone that can't play games worth for shit, this guy from the Paducah Sentinel-Courant or some such shit is staring rhapsodically over my shoulder, eyes big as saucers.

I notice a dark stain spreading on the crotch of his chinos as the Nokia dude tells this comb-over victim with severe halitosis from some nameless flyover state about the phone. His head shakes in awe and wonder as he learns that the N-Gage can play games, and MP3s, and, glory be, is a phone too. Will the wonders of the modern age never cease?

Give me a break.

Posted by flargh at 09:35 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Turns out that burglars in the UK are stupid, just like American ones. Maybe even stupider. (Thanks, mom.)

Posted by flargh at 11:36 AM | Permalink

Mike Gordon from Phish on bass, Pete Townsend of The Who on guitar, and Gary Glitter on vocals. Who should be the drummer?

Posted by flargh at 02:02 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)

I generally have a low opinion of my fellow human beings. 33 years of near-constant reenforcement demonstrating human stupidity has had a deleterious effect on my ability to presume that other people are smart or even sparked wtih the slightest self-awareness: From the warnings printed on foam fast-food restaurant coffee cups instructing me not to pour the contents therein into my crotch to the advertisements on television pitching a purple-pilled acid reflux medication to people who claim they "didn't know" that their constant need to swallow their own bile and vomit might be a sign of a gastrointestinal disorder requiring some form of treatment.

Nowhere is this more evident than in the spread of SoBig.F, the Windows worm that, once activated, spoofs e-mail addresses and spreads far and wide. This is, by far, the worst attack I've ever seen. Since last night, we've had to clear thousands of messages from our e-mail server accordingly. Many virus protection developers have already been able to provide innoculations for their customers, but that hasn't stopped the spread of the worm at all -- it continues unabated, and in the last fw hours I've seen hundreds more examples of infected e-mails.

Which leads me back to stupidity. The person who created this is not stupid, obviously, although they're demonstrating a strong trend towards sociopathy and should probably be prevented from ever using a computer again. No, the stupid people are the frickin' MORON Windows users who continue to OPEN ATTACHMENTS in their E-MAILS from PEOPLE they don't KNOW. For god's sake, leave it alone. Or better yet, buy a Mac.

Posted by flargh at 11:05 AM | Permalink | Comments (6)

So we ran a story today about the spread of a new Windows e-mail worm called SoBig.F. The worm replicates itself and sends out file attachments using spoofed e-mail address it culls from an infected host's address book.

One reader asked -- rhetorically, judging from the "no message" tag he stuck on the end of his subject line -- how this affects his Mac. Well, it doesn't, at least not directly.

Unless, of course, your e-mail address has ever been used by a Windows PC user who might have contracted this worm.

For me, it's meant about two hours in wasted productivity -- first tracking down the source of the problem and reporting it to our IT director, then creating an e-mail client rule that automatically trashes any file that manages to get through our server that's related.

Before noon, my boss had already counted more than 900 SoBig.F-related e-mails. If anything, the pace picked up after lunch.

What's almost as bad as SoBig.F is the e-mail servers' responses to it -- which is to send another message back to let users know that they've been infected. But since SoBig.F spoofs the sending e-mail address, that's basically a waste of time, since the sender is very rarely if ever the offending party.

I'd cleaned up before I broke for dinner. A couple of hours later, I had another couple hundred messages in my e-mail client that were SoBig.F related.

Posted by flargh at 09:16 PM | Permalink

according to the Which Leader Were You In A Past Life quiz.

I think it was my penchant for robes, sandals and chinese food that put me over the top for that one.

Posted by flargh at 03:26 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

...to bad rubbish. It's just a shame that the Saudi government protected this asshole long enough to let him die in peace, instead of rotting in a prison someplace.

Posted by flargh at 01:24 PM | Permalink

Here I sit, untouched by the blackouts, since we're on a different grid than New York. *phew.*

1. How much time do you spend online each day?

More time than I should.

2. What is your browser homepage set to?

Homepages are for pussies. Mine's set to a blank page.

3. Do you use any instant messaging programs? If so, which one(s)?

iChat AV these days, mostly.

4. Where was your first webpage located?

At my ISP at the time, called TIAC (they've since been acquired and disappeared). I shortly thereafter got my own domain -- Tikkabik -- which I've kept ever since.

5. How long have you had your current website?

Since 1994.

Posted by flargh at 09:58 AM | Permalink

Here's an invention that should have never been made.

Posted by flargh at 04:51 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)

Bakery-cafe chain Panera Bread is the latest nationwide company to offer Wi-Fi in its locations. What's cool about this is that Panera is taking an entirely different approach than Starbucks or Borders Books & Music. Panera is offering the service for free. Good for them!

In a press release issued last week announcing the service, the company's chairman and CEO said that Panera doesn't believe that Wi-Fi should cost customers extra, but sees it simply as an "extra amenity" that his company wants to offer an increasingly "sophisticated and diverse consumer base."

Panera plans to have about 130 locations on board by the end of the year, and already maintains a list of locations with the service (URL above). They say that the number could get to 1,000 once they've got franchisees and so on board.

This mirrors comments from Newburyopen.net maker Tech Superpowers' CEO, Michael Oh, who recently told the Boston Globe that he sees Wi-Fi like air conditioning: It should be a basic service that consumers in certain retail markets should expect without paying extra for. Right now he's talking with the City of Somerville, Mass. about setting up Davis Square as an "urban hot zone."

And really, if a vendor is already paying for access themselves either through a business ISDN line or a T1 or whatever, the cost of setting up wireless access is chump-change: A couple of hundred for an industrial-grade Wi-Fi router and a couple of hours of consulting time for a network security person, if necessary. Oh and his group will even give you the specs for how to set up an urban hot zone yourself, if you want -- they've done it on Newbury Street in Boston.

Now if we can just get the telcos and ISPs on board with the idea of making commercial access cheap enough to be ubiquitous...

Posted by flargh at 08:35 AM | Permalink | Comments (6)

The Free Software Foundation still recommends against releasing new software under the Apple Public Source License v2.0, despite the Darwin Team's attempts to bend over backwards to kiss the asses of these backwards-thinking morons.

Between RMS singing that godawful Free Software song and trite little turns of phrase like "copyleft," I've had it with these jackasses. They live in a fantasy world.

Posted by flargh at 11:38 AM | Permalink

Not everyone in Congress operates without a clue. Witness Senator Norm Coleman's (R - Minnesota) comments about the RIAA.

What is it about Minnesota's prediliction for hiring unusual politicians? This guy was beat in the governor's race by a pro wrestler, and a factoid on his site noted that he's an ex-roadie.

Then again, this is a state that is home to Al Schilling and Nate Birkholz too, so I guess I shouldn't be surprised...

Posted by flargh at 09:00 AM | Permalink

Check it out. No, not fetishists making amateur pr0n with their iSights. I mean fetish pr0n for iSight obsessives.

Posted by flargh at 08:06 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Cute James moment:

We're sitting around the kitchen table last night having supper. Bonnie had disappeared down the basement steps a few moments earlier to take care of some laundry.

"Where's mummy?" James asked, staring forlornly at a plate of steak tips and an italian vegetable combination.

"Downstairs, James. She's trying to catch up on some laundry," I replied.

"Mummy's putting ketchup on clothes?" James said. "Ewww!"

Posted by flargh at 07:50 AM | Permalink

Bonnie si teh kl0nd1k3 n1nj4 with m4d sk1llz!!!!! u ph34r, biy4tch3z.

Posted by flargh at 08:01 PM | Permalink

This is a momentous occasion -- my office is clean. I spent several hours yesterday finally getting a handle on the mess down here and got things squared away once and for all. I still have a big cardboard box filled with papers and miscellania that I have to go through, but all the myriad piles and bags filled with crap are gone. So are dozens of boxes, shipping containers, and cartons. They all got hauled away to the dump this morning.

James came down and saw it yesterday after I'd finished up. He stood in a patch of concrete about midway between the door and my desk and looked around in wonder. "Daddy," he asked, "What's your floor doing here?"

"What do you mean, James?"

"I've never seen this floor before."

Okay, "never" might be a bit of hyperbole, but the boy certainly hasn't seen that patch of floor free of obstructions in a few months.

Posted by flargh at 04:27 PM | Permalink

to this.

Posted by flargh at 12:41 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

So the Ultimate Beautiful Woman Web site tells me that I am a warrioress.

"Beautiful in your strength, sad in the fact most men are intimidated by you despite your stunning beauty."

It's like an X-RAY peering into my SOUL, I tell you.

Posted by flargh at 11:48 AM | Permalink

sigh.

1. What's the last place you traveled to, outside your own home state/country?

New York City, last month, for Macworld CreativePro Conference & Expo. I [Heart] New York, just like the T shirt says.

2. What's the most bizarre/unusual thing that's ever happened to you while traveling?

One of the strangest things that has happened actually happened to me earlier this year when I was in LA for E3. I was leaving the Nvidia party when these two guys behind me asked for a smoke. I gave them one and I noticed one of them was wearing an Nvidia sticker for the party. They were talking about taking the subway back downtown and I offered them a ride because I had a rental.

It wasn't until we were on the Hollywood Fwy heading back downtown that I realized from their conversation that these guys were a pair of homeless kids, one of whom had just picked up an Nvidia party badge out a bin because it glowed in the dark and looked cool. Fortunately, they didn't knife me or anything, and were really grateful for the ride.

Honestly, I don't think this says anything bad about my judgment -- if you've never been to E3, you can't possibly understand this, but it really can be hard to tell the difference between homeless street urchins and game company execs. Unless the guys work for Aspyr. Those guys look and smell foine.

3. If you could take off to anywhere, money and time being no object, where would you go?

Europe. New Zealand and Australia too.

4. Do you prefer traveling by plane, train or car?

Depends on the distance. Between here and NYC, I love to take the train. Any farther and I'd rather be in a plane.

5. What's the next place on your list to visit?

Maybe Austin, TX in September. We will see. Otherwise, San Francisco in January, most likely.

Posted by flargh at 11:37 AM | Permalink

I don't know whether to laugh or cry.

Nintendo president Satoru Iwata blames the shortfall in GameCube console sales to "increasingly sophisticated games." I think he's off base. At least part of the problem is an economy that's in the toilet. Another part of the problem is that outside of their first-party titles, Nintendo games suck. Nintendo also does really stupid things, like make their console incompatible for anything except playing games. Sony and Microsoft both let you play audio CDs and DVDs on their systems -- something we've taken advantage of with our own PS2.

Based on Nintendo's comments at E3 this past year, they seem to think that leveraging their success with the Game Boy Advance is the right thing to do. Now you can buy a GameCube and get a free adapter that lets you play Game Boy games on your GameCube. And the company seems to be emphasizing GBA interoperability with the GameCube in future titles.

There's only one problem with that -- if my own kids are any indication, very few gamers care about using their GBAs with their GameCube. I explained the whole thing to Bob after I got back from LA in May, and his response was to shrug and tell me he didn't really care. If that's any indication, Nintendo's doomed.

Posted by flargh at 02:57 PM | Permalink

The most fun I've been having with Mac games lately is Aspyr's Zoo Tycoon. It's not the prettiest game I've played, nor is it the most intricate or technically sophisticated title in recent memory. It's just loads of fun.

The basic premise is that you're running a zoo, and you have to make it profitable while keeping your guests and the animals comfortable and healthy. There are pre-made scenarios you can play, some of which are quite challenging. But my favorite aspect to the game is the open-ended sandbox mode that allows you to create your own zoo from scratch. My kids love it too -- they'll sit with me and tell me what animals they want in the zoo and how they should decorate each exhibit.

There are some basic rules that need to be applied to each exhibit: Animals are picky about their surroundings, so putting a rainforest tree from Malaysia in an exhibit for a South American rainforest creature is bound to cause the poor beast unnecessary duress. Some animals like water and dirt; others prefer grass, rocks and dense foliage. Once your park fills up with people, you may find that some animals find the crowds too much to bear, and need some privacy.

One thing that really appeals to me about this game is that it helps to engender a respect for animals, which Bonnie and I both feel is of paramount importance. But my kids are also pretty observant about human behavior in the zoo, too.

Even the three year old, James, told me almost as soon as we opened our zoo together that the people visiting would get hungry, and he told me to set up snack stands. He had no idea that concessions were part of the game, but he presumed (correctly) that if the animals ate, so would the people. And he reminded me that they'd also like potties to use and places to sit down and rest, because you get tired walking around the zoo all day.

It's fun, in an anarchistic sort of way, to be really mean too. I filled up my zoo with people and animals, then I walled off the exit with bricks and fired all my zookeepers (who are responsible for feeding and caretaking the animals). Then I knocked down the iron railings and stone walls of the exhibits and let the now-starving predatory animals like the lions, tigers, bears and wolves go free, with predictable results. "People don't like your zoo," the game informed me, amidst the screams of terrified people, quickly silenced by the roars of toothy beasts going in for the kill.

Posted by flargh at 09:39 AM | Permalink

From Poingferret's blog:

The trio, on the other hand, were able to instill the aforementioned fear by pointing out a beautiful girl apparently playing pool by herself, then encouraging me to go and offer the similarity that we were both carbon-based life forms. More often than not, her boyfriend would be large enough to comfortably hide a morbidly obese moose behind, perhaps using an extraneous pool table leg as a toothpick.

Chris, I know it made sense in your head. But it's the text equivalent of that Great White fire in Warwick, I swear to Christ. I've read this graf at least a half a dozen times, and each time, about half way through, my visual cortex is filled with horrible images. Car wrecks. Planes smashing into the ground. Mass graves filled with bodies. Really. This is one of the most wretched bits of prose I've read in quite some time. Kudos, you gimp, you've reduced me to sounding like you.

Posted by flargh at 12:38 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)

So there's only one real shortcoming of the house we're in: It doesn't have central HVAC. And I'm not even sure anymore that's such a problem.

The house, like many residential dwellings in the Northeast, is heated by forced hot water by natural gas. It's efficient, and it's "quality" heat. The only downside is that there's no cooling. We're fortunate in that we live in a well-ventilated house with lots of natural shading thanks to the trees, so the house is a lot cooler than the last place we lived.

About a year ago, some contractor bid a central HVAC conversion job at about 8 grand. The work wouldn't be so bad on the first floor, since we have a full basement and would be able to accommodate vents in the floors pretty easily, but the two bedrooms and bathroom upstairs would be a pain in the ass -- we'd have to wall off one of two entrances to the family room then stick vents in the closets of both bedrooms, plus god-knows-what-else for the bathroom and hallway. This past week I've discovered that we may not need it after all.

Last year we had two window-based AC units -- small, 5600 BTU ones -- in the two upstairs bedrooms. Took the edge off at night, where Emme slept most of the time since we didn't have another for her own bedroom, which is downstairs. These two were not enough to cool the house, and believe me, I tried.

After a conversation that ended with Emme dramatically telling her grandmother, "My bedroom doesn't get cool. EVER," Grandma took pity on the girl and bought her an AC, which I installed earlier this summer. We've used it a few times, but this past weekend we ran into a patch of just foul, horrible summer weather.

The heat hasn't been so bad, but we've had oppressive humidity. New England can be bad in late July and throughout August to begin with, but these past few days have been vicious -- this is Floridian weather. Constant, sopping humidity (the dew point rarely goes below 70 degrees) combined with wet, soaking thunderstorms practically every day. The air has the consistency of chowder. It's just revolting.

Add to that poor Bob -- he's getting over pneumonia. This is the third time he's had it, and the second time in a year. When he gets a respiratory infection, he has a lot of trouble shaking it. I'm hoping it's something he gets over as he gets older.

Bonnie, sweating and bedraggled, looked at me on Saturday and said, "Can we do anything about this?"

Despite my experience with the two ACs last year, I decided on a lark to shut all the windows and crank up the AC's in all three rooms full-blast. Then I went to get the van's brakes fixed, but I wasn't optimistic -- those three ACs are really designed for single-room cooling only.

I expected that I'd need at least one more unit, and something probably fairly big, like a 12,000 BTU model, to take the edge off the rest of the house. Lo and behold: When I came back that afternoon, it was 74 degrees inside, about ten degrees lower than the outside temp and a hell of a lot drier.

There's this one spot in the living room, on the sofa, where you can feel the air from the AC in Emme's room start to mix with the air flowing down from the upstairs ACs. This house has some really great circulation.

By Sunday, I also noticed that Bob's cough -- as well as some mild sniffling and sneezing the rest of us had been suffering with -- had started to dry out. Apparently there's some mix of humidity, mold and pollen in the air that is killing us all, and once we sealed up the house, the problem was resolved.

Last night we caught something of a respite from the oppressive weather, so I turned off the ACs and opened a few windows. We all felt like shit come this morning, and it's worse than ever today. So on go the ACs, down go the windows. Within about two hours, we're all feeling okay again.

Once September rolls around I'll take stock of the electric bills and try to gauge how energy-efficient this is -- to see if it'd even be worth considering the 8 grand or so we'll lose switching to central, for the quality of air we'd get. But one thing is for sure -- that third AC did the trick.

Thanks, Grandma!

Posted by flargh at 11:13 AM | Permalink

As a rabid Mac enthusiast, I have no shortage of Apple hardware in my house, although I'm neglectful about sharing it. Part of it is sheer, unadulterated greed. Most of it, though, is just craven laziness. I'm a lazy, lazy man.

So this summer has, slowly, been my venue for upgrading the household equipment. First on the list was Bonnie, who has been making do quite nicely with a 233MHz "Rev B"-era iMac that I bought back in early 1999, when prices on them had dropped as vendors flushed them out for the new "fruit" colored models. It has served us well over the years, and continues to do a great job. I stopped using the machine as my daily driver when I gained employment later that year with MacCentral and was provided with a company-issue system. I've been the beneficiary of corporate largesse since then.

Bonnie now has a G4/500MHz system upgraded with a Radeon 8500 graphics card that's attached to an olde 17-inch Panasonic VGA display which seems to be working out quite well for her. She's happy with the added performance, and has transitioned to Mac OS X easier than I expected her to.

This week, I finally got the iMac situated and hooked up in the boys' room, so the kids now have their own computer. There's no question that my own Power Mac G4 1GHz dual-processor system is ideal for gaming -- there isn't a game on the Mac out there that doesn't play spectacularly, unless it's an utter piece of crap. But I'm actually surprised, watching Bob go at it, at how competently the old iMac handles what he's been throwing at it. I'd forgotten the fun I'd had with it, playing games like Myth: The Fallen Lords and the first Carmageddon.

Bob's needs are fairly modest, in all honesty. He has a plethora of game consoles to choose from when he's in the mood for something more up-to-date, but he's quite content to use the iMac to play games like Backyard Soccer or other mainstream fare. And he's just *delighted* to have a computer to call his own, rather than having to beg for time on his mother's machine.

I'm delighted to be able to let him and the other kids have that time -- I think it's important that all of them feel a sense of ownership for their computer equipment, especially since their time at school with computers is so limited. And I long enough ago absorbed the cost of that hardware that I'm not much concerned if they break it (though I'd prefer for them to be gentle with it).

My next step for that system will be to get it on the household network, so they can do things like store backup files on our household server (I have a 40GB NAS system attached) and use the shared printers. I haven't quite decided if I'm going to actually allow the iMac to be connected to the Internet, but we'll see. The sticking point there is that I don't want the kids to access the Internet unsupervised, though Bob's usually pretty good about sticking to benign Web sites like places where he can play games.

The iMac is running Mac OS 9.2, and I don't much think I'll upgrade it to OS X unless I buy a new hard drive for it. The iMac is already fully loaded with memory, with 284MB of RAM (a 256MB chip in the lower expansion slot, and a 32MB chip in the upper), so that isn't too much of a restriction. But with 4GB of storage capacity, that just doesn't leave a lot of space for games and application software, especially if I leave the Mac ready to run OS 9 software too.

That leaves me in something of a bind with network connectivity. The easiest thing for me to do is to slap the D-Link WiFi USB adapter I already have on it, but that requires me to use Mac OS X. So I'm going to price out an Ethernet-WiFi bridge instead. Those are platform-independent and don't require drivers to operate.

Posted by flargh at 10:01 AM | Permalink

It's pretty appalling that this $165K-a-year school superintendent can't pass an English exam, and I think his ESL defense is utter bullshit.

I can't say as I'm surprised, however, given some of the horrific grammar and spelling errors Bonnie and I have seen in some of the memos and notes that have come home from school with Bob and Emme.

It's been said that those who can't, teach. I guess that this just goes to show you that those who can't teach, administrate. It's also a shining example of The Dilbert Principle in action: Cartoonist Scott Adams observes that the most incompetent workers are moved to where they can do the least damage ... Management.

Posted by flargh at 09:10 AM | Permalink

First off, let me say that I am an unabashed John Stossel fanboi. I've told Bonnie that if he ever runs for office that I'll campaign for him, and she thinks I have a little crush on him too. Anyway, Stossel's libertarian views and ability to cut through bullshit like a hot knife through butter earn him high marks in my book.

Recently he took opponents of a proposed wind farm in Nantucket Sound to task, and while I don't agree with everything he said, I think he's on the right track.

His point is that many of the opponents of the proposed wind farm are basically adopting a NIMBY (not in my backyard) approach to the issue -- sure, they're all for renewable energy, they love wind farms -- as long as they're not where *they* can see them.

Who are these opponents, Stossel asks? Among others, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who doesn't want such a facility "where his family might see it from their elegant compound in Hyannis Port." And Vineyarder Walter Cronkite, who "likes to sail on Nantucket Sound." The Cape has long been a playground for wealthy weekenders and retirees -- that's no secret to anyone who lives here or has been here often enough. Statistics show that 50 percent of the *second* homes owned in Massachusetts are on Cape Cod, as well. So it's not just the rich and famous that are barking. It's well-heeled soft-bellied upper middle class folks from Lexington and Concord that are up in arms too.

Stossel dismisses arguments that the turbines will be a hazard for boats, noting that they'll be 1,800 - 2,700 feet away from each other. If you look at the Cape Wind Web site, you'll find that the proposed site occupies Horseshoe Shoal, in a spot that's outside of the shoreline boundary of the Cape and Islands, off ferry routes, and clear of shipping channels too.

My point here is that three miles offshore is unlikely to affect the vast majority of weekend sailors, jet-skiers and other recreational boaters, many of whom stay close to shore. It might put a crimp in some recreational fishermen's plans, admittedly.

And unless they're incapacitated to the point of not being able to operate their vehicles safely to begin with, boaters should be able to dodge the turbines pretty easily. Frankly, I think it might be pretty cool to take a sailing craft through the turbine field like a skier through a slalom course, but that's just me.

There may be some environmental impact from the farm, and if that's the case, and it'll cause irrevocable damage, then let's forget about it. But I'd much rather see something like this used to generate power for three-quarters of Cape Cod than electrical plants which use barges laden with oil that have a penchant for causing millions of dollars' worth of damage in Buzzard's Bay every time they split open.

I'm also intrigued by the study that suggested that the wind farm might help ease electricity costs and free up natural gas resources. As someone who already pays a hefty amount to power and heat his house, I would welcome any savings in this area.

Posted by flargh at 12:24 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

On one hand, the kid is clearly a dumbass. On the other, I've had some pretty idiotic experiences with the TSA myself, so I can relate to that sense of frustration.

What I take particular issue with is Suffolk County DA spokesman David Procopio's misrepresentation of what happened. He called Socha's action "Putting a false bomb threat in your luggage," and that's not what it was. It was a teenage boy taunting TSA searchers to not finding one. And given that TSA reps have, in the past, stuck their OWN snarky notes in people's luggage when they've found things they don't like, the adage about people in glass houses pops to mind.

As Cory Doctorow writes on Boing Boing, "If our national security depends on teenagers abstaining from foolishness, we are doomed."

So, the kid exercised poor judgment by sticking a note in his luggage. And the TSA exercised poor judgment by overreacting to it. And now it's a public issue that everyone else can overreact to.

I believe this is what game theorists refer to as a "zero sum game."

Posted by flargh at 09:01 AM | Permalink

Music notes:

I just bought Annie Lennox's new work, Bare (via the iTunes Music Store, in case anyone cares). Holy shit, but does she fucking rawk my world.

I remember the first time I ever heard Sweet Dreams Are Made of This, and I can only say that for a handful of all the music I've ever heard in my life, so I know that it was a life-altering experience. I wouldn't say that I'm a Eurythmics otaku or an Annie Lennox stalker by any stretch of the imagination -- I don't have everything they've ever done, and I don't even have all of Annie's solo work -- though I do have my favorites, like the soundtrack to 1984, which is one of my most prized musical possessions.

But this album is incredible. There isn't a bad track on it, and there isn't a bad note that comes out of her voice. She's an incredible talent. She can do ballads, she can do rhythm and blues, she can do dance music, she can do rock. Annie Lennox can do whatever the hell she wants. She's awesome.

Posted by flargh at 12:14 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Finally, a Friday Five that doesn't suck.

1. What time do you wake up on weekday mornings?

Most often before 7am. That's when we usually start posting content on MacCentral, and while I usually schedule some entries the night before, I like to make sure everything's working okay. Besides, the kids rarely if ever let me sleep any later than that.

2. Do you sleep in on the weekends? How late?

If I'm allowed to, I'll usually catch an extra hour or two on weekends, but not usually.

3. Aside from waking up, what is the first thing you do in the morning?

Pee. Scratch my ass. Drink coffee.

4. How long does it take to get ready for your day?

About three minutes. It usually (though not always) consists of getting on sweatpants or pajama bottoms, wandering down to my office in the basement, and waking my laptop from sleep. I'll try to squeeze in a shower and a shave at least once a week.

5. When possible, what is your favorite place to go for breakfast?

Any place that serves up a great bacon and eggs and pancakes meal. I don't have a favorite, though I've had some humdingers over the years. Oh, or anywhere that'll give me a perfectly-toasted sesame bagel with a schmear of cream cheese, some lox, a nice slice of tomato and some onion.

While I'm on the subject: I love all kinds of food (and the peanut gallery says: "No shit, flargh, you're fat"). I'm happy to try anything once, and I certainly have some favorites I just can't get enough of: A perfectly grilled sirloin, fresh sushi and sashimi, good thai food. But as far as I'm concerned, the most perfect meal on earth is a stack of good pancakes, crispy bacon (yes, yes, insert bacon obsession joke at my expense here), eggs sunny side up, and wheat toast, served with some juice and a cup of strong coffee.

That's not to say that given the choice, I'd eat nothing but that, and that's not to suggest that the best food I've ever had was that, either. But I can't think of a single meal that leaves me with a greater sense of satisfaction and fulfillment than that particular combination of food. If I was on death row, that would be my last meal request.

Posted by flargh at 10:33 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

All this talk about the Vatican opposition to gay marriage is fluff. Great, the Catholic church doesn't want to recognize gay unions, oh well. Catholic priests won't be marrying any gays or lesbians with the Holy See's blessing any time soon. What's more disturbing is Bush's opposition to them and his suggestion that a constitutional amendment may be in order. I think the Executive branch of the US government has already done enough damage here thanks to that damnable Defense of Marriage Act that Bubba signed into law back in 1996.

The issue isn't whether or not your particular flavor of God blesses the union at all: It's about medical insurance and life insurance coverage. It's about being able to will your property to a loved one. It's about getting a car loan or a mortgage on a house. It's about affording some basic legal protection and some peace of mind to two people who love each other and are committed to one other.

And with divorce rates among hetero couples what they are, I think it's pig-ignorant, stupid and positively medieval to presume that such a commitment is any more or less solid simply because the couple has matching sets of genitals. Then again, your mileage may vary.

Posted by flargh at 10:21 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)