Powdered Non Sequitur Man

Best Bug Report Ever

Sam — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 17:54:43 +0000

From one of our clients (who’s usually quite good with the detail, but might perhaps have been in a bit of a hurry this morning):

Please look at this student’s profile page. He is in [a review status], but there is something weird with his record. Please let me know when this is fixed.

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Tech Support on the SS Useless

Sam — Fri, 29 Aug 2008 19:53:26 +0000

I sent in a bug report upon discovering that Kaiser’s “email my provider” feature did not, in fact, allow me to email all of the providers I’ve had appointments with, and I was reduced to using that 19th-century invention called the telephone. This was their reply [snarky comments in square brackets]:

Hello Samuel,

Thank you for your inquiry.

More information is needed to launch an investigation into your query. Please provide the following information:

- When accessing the site did you use a link, bookmark or search engine? If so try typing the web address www.kp.org directly into the address bar of your web browser program. [Um, I was *logged in*. To kp.org. When I submitted the bug report. Using kp.org.]

- Are you using a PC or a Mac? [What, are certain server-side features only available on one or the other?]

- What web browser program do you use? (AOL, Internet Explorer, Safari, Fire fox) If you are using the Compuserve web browser unfortunately we are not compatible. [See previous comment. Also -- Compuserve? Seriously?]

- Did you log in manually or wait to be prompted? If you were prompted, try going to the main page by clicking home kp.org up in the left hand side of the site. This will take you to the log on page where you should be able to log in without issue. [Didn't get the memo about my having been logged in when submitting the bug report...]

- Which feature were you attempting to access? [Um, the one I told you about?] Please describe the steps you took in reaching the feature you were trying to use. [Admittedly, I didn't provide a detailed set of steps to repro, which was my bad. But I didn't expect to get a reply like this either.]

- What page were you on when the error occurred? [I included a frickin' link.]

- Did you receive an error message? If so, what did it say?

- How many times did you try using this feature? [Enough times to realize it wasn't actually there.]

- Have you tried on different days or from different computers? [What, I can only email my provider on Tuesdays?]

- What is the name of the physician and what facility you physician located in. We need this to add the physician to your drop down menu. [Again, I included a link to this provider!]

Please respond to this message with the aforementioned information so that we may further assist you. [And while I'm at it, why don't I ship you my laptop, too?]

Kaiser Permanente : Helping our members live long and thrive. [By annoying the living shit out of them when they talk back.]

[name deleted to protect the guilty]
Web Site Support Representative
Kaiser Permanente

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Miscellaneous Silliness

Sam — Fri, 29 Aug 2008 17:18:29 +0000

The New Yorker: If adults were subjected to the same indignities as children.

Also, I rode by a motel some of you may find familiar this morning, and their sign read:

WALK IN SPECIAL
PARKING $5.00

I’m so sorry I forgot to bring my camera…

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Baby Blog

Sam — Tue, 19 Aug 2008 20:50:29 +0000

Say, loyal readers (all six of you) — if you thought I wasn’t posting frequently before, think how much longer you’ll get to stare at the same blog posts now that I’m a dad with a baby blog!

That’s right; I said “baby blog.” Welcome to the Panopticon.

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An Open Letter

Sam — Wed, 13 Aug 2008 12:11:24 +0000

To the town of Walla Walla, Washington, of whose onions I am extremely fond:

What information does the second “Walla” provide that the first “Walla” did not?

“Walla Walla, Washington — so great, they named it twice.”
“Walla Walla, Washington — yes, we really said ‘Walla’. Get over it.”
“Walla Walla, Washington — not to be confused with Dishwalla. Or Odwalla.”

This post brought to you by a newborn’s sleep patterns. Whee!

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Test post

Sam — Sun, 10 Aug 2008 02:11:46 +0000

This is a test of the WordPress app on my iPod, which looks to be amazingly useful. Here is a photo from my library…

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And So It… Erm… Continues, I Guess

Sam — Thu, 07 Aug 2008 00:18:21 +0000

We’re home. Everyone’s healthy and happy.

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And So It Begins

Sam — Sun, 03 Aug 2008 15:30:37 +0000

No more practice runs — we’re off to the hospital.

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Quote Machine

Sam — Fri, 01 Aug 2008 18:05:13 +0000

I just ran across the following in our bug-tracking database, and I don’t think I’ve laughed this hard in weeks:

Logic appears to have been sprinkled throughout this code base liberally, possibly in the hope that it will flourish and self-organize into some sort of ecosystem, with the most fit decision points surviving to reproduce and the less fit being deleted by angry programmers. This is not a very efficient genetic algorithm. At the risk of forming a monoculture, I’ve, um, domesticated a small fraction of this.

–Joel Hoffman

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Iron Chef Rails!

Sam — Sat, 26 Jul 2008 23:07:34 +0000

It’s been over a month since I posted. If any of you are still watching this, you might be interested to know that last week a colleague and I won a local programming competition. fawnapril was highly amused that I spent so many hours preparing for a 20-minute event, but it paid off in the end, with each of us going home with some lovely Stumptown coffee (that I’m passing off to some friends who will appreciate it) and a $50 gift certificate to Powell’s (already spent), and, of course, the glory and honor that comes with the title of “Iron Chef Rails.”

Theoretically, there’s event video; I’ll try to remember to update this post when it becomes available.

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Tautology FAIL

Sam — Sat, 26 Jul 2008 20:58:42 +0000

I rather like the song, which is why it’s on my coding playlist in the first place, but it really annoys me that the only bit of the lyrics I can actually hear clearly is the line “Why is eternity forever?”

Seriously, Delerium. Did nobody notice that Jon Crosby had rewritten your lyrics under cover of darkness?

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Overheard In The (Very Manly) Kitchen

Sam — Tue, 24 Jun 2008 04:14:59 +0000

The scene: we’ve just cored and smooshed a lot of strawberries, and Fawn is stirring in the pectin to make freezer jam.

Her: It’s such a beautiful color. It’s much prettier than the cooked jam.
Me: Yeah, that stuff gets a little bit lighter pink.
Her: Not this deep red.
Me: Like the blood of your enemies!
Her: What? No! It’s not even blood-colored!
Me: Well, no.
Her: Why did you say that?
Me: Because it sounded Klingon.
Her: Why are we sounding Klingon when we’re making jam?
Me: Exactly.

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Ten Years Later…

Sam — Tue, 17 Jun 2008 23:23:17 +0000

…it’s still weird to IM someone sitting one desk away.

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All Dressed Up, Nowhere to Goth

Sam — Sun, 01 Jun 2008 05:49:55 +0000

Despite my having slept for at least 15 of the last 24 hours, and despite F feeling even more sick than me, we got up off the couch and went to the Aladdin Theater for tonight’s Peter Murphy show. Peter, however, must have had the same thing we have, because the show, it was canceled.

Still, we got our money back and got to see some pretty outfits, so the evening wasn’t a total loss.

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Lolkid

Sam — Mon, 26 May 2008 02:42:13 +0000

[One] thing that made yesterday teh aw3som3: tiggrrl and the_misha taught their adorable two-year-old to say “OH NOES!”

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Rock On, Little Computer, Rock On

Sam — Wed, 21 May 2008 19:53:42 +0000

Some Berkeley students built a computer vision system to play Rock Band.

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Mister Language Person, Photographic Edition

Sam — Tue, 20 May 2008 20:47:27 +0000

Give me my violas NOW, or I’ll prosecute you!

Because there’s nothing worse than trying to get on the Internet without enough spee.

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Tools and Transformations

Sam — Thu, 15 May 2008 00:46:27 +0000

Clay Shirky is a really interesting writer, if you happen to find analysis of the intersection between software and sociology interesting. His new book “Here Comes Everybody” looks quite interesting (being too cheap to buy the hardback, I’ve got it on hold at the library).

Here’s a bit from a blog post he wrote recently:

Imagine a technology that, from its inception, threatens to throw intellectual society into chaos, a technology that radically democratizes both production and consumption of media while creating countless new forms of expression. Now imagine that while some of the new material produced is of lasting value, most is evanescent at best, and that the resulting flood of material weakens traditional institutions, eroding their special place in society by making the functions they provide seem irrelevant to young people.

Imagine, in other words, that this technology creates a stark choice between preserving the current state of society vs. embracing the new, even given the destruction of of traditional values and institutions. Which side would you be on?

I don’t have to ask, because if you are reading a Penguin blog, you have already identified yourself as one of the revolutionaries, an embracer of the most intellectually radical technology the world has ever seen: the printing press.

Read the rest here.

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Goofus and Gallant — OF THE FUTURE!

Sam — Mon, 12 May 2008 17:32:02 +0000

A coworker of mine back at ~~Wolfram & Hart~~HellerEhrman had a wonderful spoof of Goofus and Gallant on his wall. I was remembering it recently, and naturally, it’s on the Web. Enjoy: Looking Forward: Goofus and Gallant.

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Resources

Sam — Wed, 23 Apr 2008 16:42:43 +0000

According to the Cost of War counter, we are currently spending $3,951 per second to… uh… wait, what are we doing in Iraq this week? Oh, yeah. JACK SHIT, that’s what.

Check my math if you like. The site lists a figure of $341.4 million per day. There are (24 hrs/day * 60 mins/hr * 60 secs/min) = 86,400 seconds in a day. $341,400,000/day divided by 86,400 secs/day = $3,951.39/second.

(Amusingly, the JavaScript required to display the money counter is taking about 25-30% of one of my CPUs.)

I was prompted to look this up by an 8th-grader on the bus this morning who was telling his buddy about an imprisoned illegal immigrant whose health care was costing the county $25,000 a month. I wish I’d had this number handy half an hour ago; in the time it would have taken me to repeat it, we’d have racked up $25k and then some.

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