Just got home. Drive was fine, if a bit rainy (in other words, we were never in any *actual* danger of being washed off the roadway). Weed was, well, Weed. At least the Mexican restaurant had decent enchiladas and Midori margaritas.
The key phrase for this week is “wintry mix.”
We drove down to Auburn on Saturday, hung out with family for Christmas, and then spent Monday and Tuesday nights with Justin and Monica at her family’s cabin just outside Tahoe City. The first night was pretty cold, but once the wood stove had a chance [...]
Finally reasonably recovered from our 12-hour drive on Friday (lots of sleep and a lovely Christmas dinner helped considerably). Our cat Jack (see here and here) seems to be doing quite well here: he’s only puked once, when he tried to eat the special dry food we’ve been giving him for two years [...]
From today’s Daily WTF:
Mark: I’m a bit puzzled why the first line of the address for each customer is the primary key in the Customer’s Table …
Developer: I decided that was the most unique item for each entity
Mark: So what happens when you get a customer that shares the same first line of the address?
Developer: [...]
Driving back home after dropping fawnapril off at work, I passed a church marquee giving information about their CHRSITMAS [sic] services.
I so badly want to call up their church offices and say, “Hello, I’m calling to let you know about a problem with your marquee outside. Apparently nobody noticed, but YOU MISSPELLED THE NAME [...]
Three wire story headlines from Salon, in chronological order:
Bush Asserts U.S. Is Winning Iraq War
Bush Presses Case Against Iraq Pullout
U.S. Ran Afghan Torture Prison, Group Says
Weep for the future.
We’ve got snow! Came on pretty suddenly, too. Looks like we left Carb Fest just in time… (=
Watching Globe Trekker, they had a brief piece on a hill of crosses in Lithuania. Wow. Justin especially should check it out: link 1, link 2.
Math has permanently warped my brain.
I was pinning a project together today, and trying to figure out which way to align the pins so that I could pull them out when they got close to the needle of the sewing machine. Eventually I worked out that they always needed to be pointing in such [...]
Anyone got tips to share on how to clean up molasses?
[EDIT: Most of a kettle of hot water seems to have done the job.]
Playing around with Backpack (which, by the way, is the coolest to-do list app ever, but of course it does so much more), I got the idea to consolidate the numerous wish lists I’ve accumulated over the years and can never find when I want to refer people to them.
So if for some reason you [...]
Bush Takes Blame For Iraq Invasion, Intel.
“It is true that much of the intelligence turned out to be wrong,” Bush said. “As president, I’m responsible for the decision to go into Iraq.”
This would be a whole lot more meaningful if Bush seemed to have any idea what “responsibility” actually means. Google will lead you [...]
Final grades are in: three As (in Vector Calculus, Software Engineering, and Science Through Science Fiction) and one B (in Applied Statistics for Engineers and Scientists).
This means, among other things, that I NEVER HAVE TO TAKE THAT DAMN STATS CLASS AGAIN. Stats can actually be fun, but that class really took the joy [...]
Just got an email from my calculus teacher — the one I’d been expecting a B from. Turns out I got 97/100 on the final, which apparently netted me an A in the course. Sweet!
Just ordered replacements for the sunglasses I lost a few weeks ago — between the end-of-year clearance and an additional 20% off coupon, I only paid 38% of retail. Nothing like getting excellent deals on headache protection.
“Q, stop that! We do not eat vomit in this house!”
(Spoken to one of our senior cats.)
FINALLY DONE WITH THIS TERM.
Stats final wasn’t the bloodbath I was expecting; however, there was quite a bit more to the CS project than I thought was left. So where I expected to spend tonight watching a stupid vampire action flick, I instead spent it writing a few documents and making tarballs. Whee.
And [...]
Here’s a tip: if you’re trying to gather signatures for your ballot petition, don’t argue with me when I point to the “NO SOLICITING (if you don’t know us, don’t bug us!)” sign on my door. Just because you’re not selling something doesn’t mean you’re not soliciting — you are, in fact, asking [...]
While Googling to find out how long DNA remains stable, I ran across a highly entertaining web exhibit on aliens at a UK science museum. While you might have noticed that I’m not much for most “what kind of X are you?” quizzes, I must recommend this one as being (a) quite witty and [...]