Tikkabik

Quaker teacher fired for changing loyalty oath: "California State University East Bay has fired a math teacher after six weeks on the job because she inserted the word 'nonviolently' in her state-required Oath of Allegiance form."

Wow, awesome. Take a career teacher who teaches remedial math at a public university, and is happy to do it, and shitcan her for making a couple of minor, harmless edits to a "loyalty oath" to stay consistent with her religious beliefs.

No good dead goes unpunished, as they say.

I hope she gets another job soon, preferably one with better pay and with better respect from the management.

Posted by flargh at 05:04 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

readybot.com

I know it sounds funny, but I grew up in a house without a dishwasher. And I remember how thrilled my mother was when we got our first unit, which was one of those on-caster jobs that connected to the kitchen faucet and rolled away when it wasn't in use. For her, it was one of the single best home improvement investments she had made up until that time, because it saved her from countless combined hours of drudgery in front of the sink.

That's a bit how I felt watching ReadyBot do his thing. I hope they actually get this into production someday, because I am just tickled with the idea of having a kitchen robot slave to do all the cleaning.

Posted by flargh at 05:34 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

CapeCodTimes.com - German police dogs to wear shoes: "Police dogs in the western city of Duesseldorf will no longer get their feet dirty when on patrol - the entire dog unit will soon be equipped with blue plastic fiber shoes, a police spokesman said Monday."

As long as they're not jackboots.

Posted by flargh at 12:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Despite our better judgment, we ended up watching the Oscars last night. Seemed to be a good year for foreign actors, which is good. I'll be frank, I haven't seen a damn thing that won an award, I think, except for Sweeney Todd. Bonnie and I hardly ever get to the movies unless it's a kids movie, and it's usually more worthwhile for us just to buy the DVD than it is to go to the theater.

I do like the stuff I've seen Javier Bardem in, however, so I was happy to see him and the Coen Bros. win awards, because I like their stuff too. And I thought Jon Stewart was a great host.

I'm not sure whose idea it was -- Stewart's or someone else's -- to have Marketa Irglova come back on stage and deliver her acceptance speech for Best Song. But whosever idea it was, it was classy. And that's something you don't often get at the Oscars, so that was nice.

Also, can someone tell me what the hell is wrong with Renee Zellweger's face? It's a cross between "I'm sucking the sourest lemon in the universe" and "help, a vacuum is hoovering my features off."

Posted by flargh at 08:46 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

When I woke up on Sunday morning a week ago, I felt a tickle in my throat and a throb in my sinuses that I suspected was the start of a cold. I hoped against hope that it wasn't the flu that my kids had had the week before, but sure enough, by Monday afternoon, it was apparent that I had it. It's run its course; I spent much of the week alternately under covers sleeping it off or sitting in the easy chair in the living room moaning and being miserable. I went outside as infrequently as possible.

I'm still fighting off the after effects. Alarming yellow discharge from my nose and lungs seems par for course, along with an irritating cough, which I suspect will be with me for another week or so, if the kids are any indication. So's a little bit of lightheadedness.

Man, I hate getting sick.

Posted by flargh at 02:33 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Based on the initial feedback we're seeing in our forums and the conversations I've had with other colleagues who train people to use Aperture, it's clear that a sizable percentage of people who are reading about Aperture's release and even trying the software all Just. Don't. Get It.

A certain percentage of users mistakenly thing that Aperture is an image editing utility. It isn't. It has image editing capabilities -- things like red eye reduction, image straightening, cropping, and quite marvelous color correction capabilities -- but that's only one aspect of the app.

As Rick LePage intimated in a PMA blog he wrote for Macworld, the question in many photographers' minds isn't pitting Aperture against Adobe Lightroom, contrary to what the layperson might be thinking after reading a cross-section of comments in places like Macworld. It's really whether Aperture or Lightroom is suitable to replace an existing post-production workflow, or whether a post-production workflow is necessary at all.

I'd posit that for any photographer who's taking any reasonable volume of pictures he or she wants to archive and catalog, a post-production workflow is necessary -- in fact, it's vital. You need to be able to find pictures you've taken, and eventually, any sort of indexing and folder archiving system you've come up with is bound to catch up with you.

But many photographers already use combinations of Photoshop and Bridge, iView Media Pro (now Expression Media), Photo Mechanic and a handful of other apps -- including some very cumbersome and expensive solutions rolled with products like Canto Cumulus -- to manage their digital workflow. And Apple still needs to answer the question -- "Why would I give that up?"

So far they've done a good job of articulating what Aperture can do, thanks to training information on their Web site and exposés on the new features in 2.0. Now they really need to get down to the nitty gritty and figure out a way to sell it to people who are already using other workflows -- and to that end, they haven't made it happen yet.

Posted by flargh at 02:21 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Scooted out to Nyack, NY to spend the weekend learning about Aperture 2. My head is absolutely full of stuff. I've had a few days to play with the application since it came out on Tuesday and I'm amazed by what I see. It's a huge improvement over the 1.5 release.

It's given me time to be a bit navel-contemplative. For those of you who know what I do, it may seem incongruous that the Macworld "games guy" might have such an interest in digital photography.

Actually, I've always liked photography, ever since I was a kid. My mom had an old Konica SLR I used to play with, and I took a few good photos with it. But until the digital age, it wasn't a hobby that I could really afford to indulge in. Plus, I didn't really want to mess with chemicals.

But back in the mid-90s, around the same time I started this Web site, actually, I got an Apple QuickTake 100 camera from Apple. I won it during a raffle at some Apple event or other that I went to. I've been snapping digital photos ever since.

Apple released Aperture 1.0 in 2005, and I took an immediate interest in it. There have been photographic workflow and digital asset management software applications for years, but Apple put its own spin on it, providing non-destructive image editing capabilities that don't take up enormous amounts of disk space, powerful metadata cataloging and searching capabilities, and other tools under one roof.

I was impressed with it right off the bat, and even more so about the time that 1.5 was released in 2006. So when I was given the opportunity to get some Apple-led training on the application, I jumped at the chance, and I've been very happy for it.

Photographers are very much creatures of habit. Some prefer Nikons, while others prefer Canons, for example. In the same token, Aperture isn't necessarily the best choice for every photographer out there -- some may prefer Adobe Lightroom, or Camera Bits Photo Mechanic, or Microsoft Expression Media.

OK, that last part was a joke. No one prefers Expression Media.

Regardless, it's been a good run so far, and I'm delighted for the opportunity to expand my skills beyond just games and graphic cards, and I'm happy to be able to do it without negatively impacting my ability to cover those other beats for Macworld.

Posted by flargh at 11:01 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Recently the Mashpee High School has been the victim of bomb threats which, by all accounts, appear to be pranks instigated by students.

Today, though, we got a pre-recorded message from the principal announcing that school was being dismissed shortly after it started because they'd found another threat and were evacuating students and sending them home.

This follows on the heels of another message that said that suspects had been apprehended in the previous case.

Whatever the case is, I hope the school gets to the bottom of it -- and I hope that some kid, somewhere, gets expelled for being such a complete and utter dumbass.

Posted by flargh at 10:48 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

from Bonnie this morning. Staying on task was nigh impossible.

Robert had asked her to cut up a coffee cake I bought at the grocery store last night.

"Mrow."

Max was calling. He was sitting in the middle of the living room floor, looking stricken. No one had opened the blind yet so he couldn't yet sit in the window.

"Oh, poor kitty," said Bonnie, walking over to the window and opening the blind.

Then Bonnie saw the pillows and cushions were askew on the sofa. She straightened them out and then sat down. James had left some pens and pencils on the floor, and Bonnie started collecting them.

"Hey," said Robert. "Are you gonna cut the coffee cake?"

Posted by flargh at 09:45 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

My new specs


Originally uploaded by flargh.

Here are my new glasses. I don't really need them, but I wanted to reduce eye strain when I'm using the computer, and my employer's vision plan is pretty good. I picked them up from the local optical place yesterday.

Posted by flargh at 07:46 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Today's Bonnie's 38th, and we're celebrating ... by doing very little. We tried to go out to dinner and go shopping last night but it was a disaster. Robert is sick, Emmeline was cranky and even James was in a bad mood. I told our server it was Bonnie's birthday and she offered to bring Bonnie ice cream and have the servers sing happy birthday, but by the time we were done with our dinners, I asked for the check instead and left in a hurry.

Today is a really low-key day. We're just taking it easy. I'll make Bonnie's preferred dinner -- steak and potatoes -- in a little while, and I bought her a small round Carvel's ice cream cake too.

Posted by flargh at 04:36 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

7AM. Time to wake up Emmeline. She's a heavy sleeper.

"Emmeline."

Nothing.

"EMMELINE."

Still nothing.

"EMMELINE!"

"What?!"

Get up. Time to get ready.

I resume my normal routine -- I'm starting to check around for stories to post. Ten minutes pass by before I realize that Emmeline hasn't stirred.

"EMMELINE!"

She sits upright in bed, and slowly starts to move. Her bus typically gets here between 7:25 and 7:30. She needs to be up and ready by then. She's now got 15 minutes to brush her hair, brush her teeth, get breakfast, get dressed. Not necessarily in that order.

Ten minutes pass by, and she emerges from her room. She hasn't brushed her hair yet, and she's wearing a pair of mismatched socks. She doesn't believe me when I tell her that she looks silly. Finally I get Bonnie to throw down a pair of her own socks to wear.

Again, this has shaved precious minutes off the clock. Emmeline now has no time for breakfast -- not even a bowl of cold cereal. Wendy, her van driver, is going to be here any second.

As a compromise, to get something in her stomach, I recommend a cereal bar or two. This is unacceptable. Apparently Emmeline finds the four different flavors of cereal bar (strawberry, blueberry, peanut butter and oats, chocolate and oats) to be unacceptable choices. She stands there staring at me, looking stricken, mouth agape, tears welling up in her eyes with the unfairness of it all.

At this point I lose my temper and start screaming. I've had quite enough of this shit, thank you.

Meantime, the sink's overflowing with dishes from last night's dinner, because the kids have neglected the one daily chore that we insist that they do: Empty the dishwasher. Not fill the dishwasher, mind you. Just empty the goddamn thing. And Robert has left for school already, so the other two are on strike. After all, with one sibling gone, neither of them can be expected to make up the difference.

There's no room in the sink for me to rinse and fill the coffee pot, so the coffee has to wait until I clear the dishwasher, fill it up and start it again.

As I'm doing this, Wendy pulls up, and Emmeline grabs her things to go. "I need seven dollars," she says as an afterthought.

"What for?" I ask incredulously.

"A book."

"Well, I don't *have* seven dollars," I tell her. "If you'd asked me yesterday, I might have been able to get some. But I don't have any cash."

"Oh well," she says in a huff. "I guess I'll just have to tell the teacher!"

So it's turning out to be one of those days.

Posted by flargh at 08:04 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Ever since we got an HD-capable TV, I find myself watching the HD channels as much as possible. One of my favorites is the National Geographic channel, since they usually show gorgeous footage -- nature, CGI of cosmic phenomena, etc. They always interview scientists with interesting things to say. At least I thought so.

James was watching it with me as I was waiting for dinner to cook this evening.

"Why is everyone on this channel a nerd?" he asked, impatiently.

He said this, by the way, while playing a computer game in his "The Penguin Made Me Do It" t-shirt. Moments after singing "Secret Asian Man."

Posted by flargh at 08:04 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Well, Super Tuesday is upon us. Emmeline missed her bus this morning, which worked out well -- the polling place in our town is her school, so I was able to kill two birds with one stone when I dropped her off this morning.

Unfortunately, many of the people voting clearly were unfamiliar with how the lot was laid out, and were either entering through the exit or were driving the wrong way around the (ostensibly) one-way lot. And there were no police to direct traffic. So getting in and out of the school parking lot was hazardous.

There was a long line to vote by the time I got there (around 10 AM), which bodes well. Hopefully there will be a good turnout statewide, lousy weather in some parts today notwithstanding.

Posted by flargh at 03:40 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Not in the literal sense -- I didn't touch a drop of alcohol yesterday. But throughout New England people are grabbing their heads and moaning at the loss of the Patriots at the hands of the Giants yesterday. They were a team of destiny! They were undefeated! What happened?

Near as I can tell, they got a taste of their own medicine is all. They were outplayed. They fought valiantly, there's no question -- that's why the score was 7-3 up until late in the game. Both team's defense turned up the heat. But in the end, Eli Manning was able to make the best out of a few crucial plays, and Tom Brady wasn't, and that's all there was to it.

Bostonist has another theory.

Posted by flargh at 12:13 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

It promises to be a pretty quiet day for us, festivities in Arizona notwithstanding. We'd invited a couple of friends over to watch the game on our projector this evening but they can't make it, so it looks like it's just going to be us and the kids.

We had a quiet morning this morning -- Emmeline slept over her friend Vicki's and James slept over his grandmother's, so Robert had the house to himself this morning, which he loved.

Posted by flargh at 11:53 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

CapeCodTimes.com - Mashpee opposes tribe's land plan: "The town of Mashpee is asking the U.S. Bureau of Indian Affairs to deny the Mashpee Wampanoag's land-into-trust application, a move that could stall the tribe's plans for a $1 billion casino."

Whites have been screwing over Native Americans for centuries by implementing treaties that they break or ultimately don't even attempt to enforce over and over again. So the irony of the town of Mashpee saying they want a deal that guarantees them in writing that the Wampanoag tribe won't go after land controlled by (non-native) landowners is undeniable.

Posted by flargh at 07:57 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)