darkwombatdude

04:34 pm: So. What do you health-oriented people think about the hygiene hypothesis? Also mentioned here.

04:54 pm: So I haven't updated in a while. Slashdot pointed me to this wondrous device that's not around yet. However, unlike the other pieces of technology that I'm lusting after, this one sounds like it will be affordable. They claim it will cost as much as a high end cell phone, which still would mean several hundred dollars, but it might be less than the Zero Touch LP (and the company hasn't gone out of business) and may be comparable to the IBiz Laser keyboard which was tied up for over two years in litigation, but now seems to be available again.

Here it is: http://www.artlebedev.com/portfolio/optimus/

07:10 pm: Word of mouth.
So as many of you know, I recently moved to a new home over in Clairemont Mesa. It's nice, it's spiffy, I now have mortgages totaling hundreds of thousands of dollars. Ever since I moved in, I have been receiving a barrage of snail mail from various companies and vendors most of which say "Welcome to the neighborhood." Now I know it's a matter of public record that I bought the house, and that anyone can walk in off the street and get my address. However, did all of these companies do that?

On the latest batch of snail mail spam, I discovered that they did not. I used the oft-ignored talent I have of "Reading Fine Print" and discovered a tiny line of text which stated "Copyright 2002 Moving Targets" along with a phone number (215-257-0880) and a website (www.movingtargets.com). A brief visit to the website confirmed what I suspected. This is a company which does nothing but scour the public record and sell the information it finds to businesses.

I am annoyed, since these sorts of things push my buttons.

So, beware! If you ever move or buy a place of your own, remember to contact these people first and opt-out.

Update:
I called the company on Monday, and had my call taken by a pleasant sounding woman named Christy Snyder. It was clear that this number didn't get much traffic, since I was not greeted by a computer and was answered on the fourth ring. Cristy sounded like the perfect marketer, speaking flawlessly elocuted English. However, when I revealed that I wasn't a customer and was in fact one of the products speaking to her, she wigged out. She told me that they absolutely couldn't remove my name and that I'd have to talk to the DMA about all requests for removal. I told her that I already had, and that it was past the time that requests to them had to be acknowledged by other companies. Flustered, she took down my number and said that she'd have someone call me back.

Today, after not receiving a phone call, I called them back. I was prepared to firmly insist that my name be removed from their database on the threat that I would begin writing letters to the businesses who contacted me stating exactly why I would not be redeeming their coupons or giving them my business. I was prepared to debate with them the value of having one more name on their list even if that name was hostile to what they were doing. However, this time, my call was answered by another person named Michelle. She too gave a slight pause when she realized I wasn't a business looking to buy names, but after my request, she took down my information, told me my name would be purged from their lists, offered to give me the address of the DMA, and thanked me for my time. In short, she didn't ruin my lunchbreak as her colleague had done yesterday. I'm one step closer to receiving a tolerable level of junk.

08:30 am: Grandmaster Babbage speaks!
"The most important part of the Analytical Engine was undoubtedly the mechanical method of carrying the tens. On this I laboured Incessantly, each succeeding improvement advancing me a step or two. The difficulty did not consist so much in the more or less complexity of the contrivance as in the reduction of the time required to effect the carriage. Twenty or thirty different plans and modifications had been drawn. At last, I came to the conclusion that I had exhausted the principle of successive carriage. I concluded also that nothing but teaching the engine to forsee and then to act upon that foresight could ever lead me to the object I desired, namely, to make the whole of any unlimited number of carriages in one unit of time.

One morning, after I had spent many hours in the drawing-office in endeavouring to improve the system of successive carriages, I mentioned these views to my chief assistant, and added that I should retire to my library and endeavour to work out the new principle. He gently expressed a doubt whether the plan was possible, to which I replied that... I should follow out a slight glimmering of light which I thought I perceived.

After about three hours examination, I returned to the drawing-office with much more definite ideas upon the subject. I had discovered a principle that proved the possibility, and I had contrived a mechanism which, I thought, would accomplish my object. I now commenced the explanation of my views, which I soon found were but little understood by my assistant; nor was this surprising, since in the course of my own attempt at explanation, I found several defects in my plan, and was also led by his questions to perceive others. All these I removed one after another, and ultimately terminated at a late hour my morning's work with the conviction that anticipating carriage was not only within my power, but that I had devised one mechanism at least by which it might be accomplished.

Many years after, my assistant, on his return from a long residence abroad, called upon me, and we talked over the progress of the Analytical Engine. I referred back to the day on which I had made that most important step, and asked him if he recollected it. His reply was that he perfectly remembered the circumstance; for that on retiring to my library, he seriously thought that my intellect was beginning to become deranged.

09:37 pm: It's another holiday, and once again I'm going to enjoy it and really celebrate it. Part of what makes holidays fun for me is really celebrating them in a way above and beyond the "mundane" way of doing it.

OK. So it's St. Patrick's day. A day where wearing green is in. What really is the meaning of the green, and what are the subtler messages it sends? These questions must be answered before the holiday can be properly celebrated.

As you likely know, Ireland is a passionate nation. Their passion runs deep in many areas. There are the two prominent conflicts which divide the loyalists from the separatists, and also the Irish Catholics from the Irish Protestants. According to my sources there are areas in Ireland where the curb stones are painted red white and blue to signify unity with the British kingdom, or green white and gold to symbolize a separate Irish nation.

Furthermore, in my youth, my family had a cassette from one of the greatest bands ever. The Irish Rovers. They had a wonderful song with a catchy tune which necessitated an explanation from my parents about the Catholic/Protestant conflict to their seven year old son. (At that age, I took the lyrics literally and thought it hilarious that a boy would have an orange father and a green mother.)

Effectively, to wear green in relation to Ireland, you're proclaiming yourself to be a Catholic who would like an independent Ireland.

I am a Protestant.

Therefore, tomorrow, I shall wear orange!

10:11 pm: Just in case anyone is wondering what I'm listening to right now, I'm presently enamored with "Carra's Lament."

I realized a while ago that I don't like individual bands or even individual songs. Rather, there are patterns of notes that I really like. If one song contains the patterns that I like, then I like it, regardless of who performs it. Carra's Lament contains such patterns.

09:46 am: Ordinarily I don't play with memes or dumb little quizzes. This one returned very amusing results though, so I place it here that you might be amused as well.

If I were God over LiveJournal... by shinikami
Username
Jesus would be	jackbishop
The four archangels would be	hippy_goth
and	nolly
and	myalchod
and	krhofman
The Blessed Virgin would be	ellienihon
Satan would be	odinnsmeyjar
The antichrist would be	dinahdelphi
And YOU would be	A saint
Quiz created with MemeGen!

07:30 pm: Recently, I came to an understanding as to why exactly these times of home buying have been stressful for me. For many of you, this is the first time you have heard about my attempt to become a home owner. More pictures and details will be posted once everything finally falls into place. This place I am looking to buy is not inherently special in and of itself. While it is entirely refurbished and is clean and comfortable, it is far from the perfect home. The stress I feel is not coming because I might not get this particular home. There is no secret treasure chest of gold buried under the property or anything like that.

I feel stressed out, because on a subconscious level, I am being judged by "The System". I have taken scores of documents, assembled them into one package and sent them to a large bank. "Judge me worthy." I am saying. "Validate my sense of responsibility by trusting me with hundreds of thousands of dollars." Consciously, I don't need a faceless being, half-man half-bureaucrat, to tell me that I'm a responsible person. I can hold down a job, don't smoke, and don't have a string of car crashes or a rap sheet on my record. I have excellent credit. I know I'm responsible. However, there is still a need for validation from an institution.

The chief point has been relating to my employment. I don't have two years of continuous employment in my field. I have one year, eight months. The recession is responsible for that. If I had the two years, then the money dispensing drone would have zero trouble with giving me what I need. There are "guidelines" that the underwriters must follow. They are not allowed to deviate from them in the slightest. The only reason they're called "guidelines" and not "immutable laws of nature" is because exceptions can be filed on my behalf and a manager may override them if I am found worthy.

There is a picture of what a responsible human looks like, and for all my life of paying bills on time, not being a liability, and not flitting capriciously as a zephyr, I don't fit that picture. Not precisely. I suppose this is meant to teach me something about what's important...

11:24 pm: The Lenten journey, two weeks in.
So it turns out that there has always been a fight between Carnival and Lent.

05:38 pm: Brzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzah
I have a new friend. It is another machine. This machine has lived in my room for a little over a year, but it was just recently that I realized what a good friend it was. I speak of my dear friend, the shredder.

I took a step back from the constant struggle of cleaning and organization and realized that part of the problem was that there was simply too much paper in the mix. Little junk trinkets I can deal with by putting them in geocaches. Clothes go in the clothes pile. Books go in the books pile. Paper goes in the paper pile. The problem is that there is a huge amount of paper and that I get more of it each day. Usually it's scattered all over my room. Envelopes that I know are spam but sit around anyway. Financial statements that need to be classified and put into the filing cabinet. Documents relating to study topics that people give me. Lists of dates and signup sheets. It's just a mess.

My friend can help with all this. My friend can give me a sense of closure for each individual item. Even if it's not sensitive information, I get a really good feeling when one piece of paper or another disappears down the slot. This piece of paper is done. It is at an end. It will never come back. You will never see it again. Closure is a very good term for it. If I need one piece of information off a sheet, I copy it down onto a hard drive and then shred the physical copy. There is fundamentally less "stuff" in my room, and it makes the job of organization and cleaning that much easier.

I have moral problems with waste. If I had it my way, every piece of packaging would be completely recyclable, and would be guaranteed to be recycled after its current form. That said, I cannot throw even junk mail into the trash. If it can be recycled, it must be recycled. The shredder helps with this too. All kinds of diverse papers and envelopes become one clean, unified, homogeneous mass which can then be put into a garbage bag and taken to the recycling center.

So yeah, I've been having fun recently. I am getting a natural high from being able to organize more effectively by the utter removal of things that need to be sorted.

09:55 pm: Ashes to ashes.
Today was a big day for me. It was a special, meaningful day. As you can imagine, today was far more important to me than yesterday.

I had decided at the beginning of the week to do something I had never done before in any of my other years. I decided to take the bold step and mark myself at the beginning of the day with the ash mark. My church holds only one service, due to a low population. That service is held only in the evening. I question exactly, what the value of being visibly marked is if you don't get to walk around with it all day, showing people that you observe this holi-day.

Naturally, I was quick to recall the admonition of the Lord, when He said "Don't be like the Pharisees who pray loudly on the street corners. And don't make a huge show of your suffering if you decide to have a fast." I also remembered that each and every Lent, I make an effort to improve myself, and give up, among other things, my arrogance. At least for the 45 days between now and Easter. In the end, I felt that displaying my observance would not violate either of these. This entry does not violate them either. I am writing this as an explanation, not a boast, of my piety.

Now, the average non-Christian probably doesn't have the first idea about what goes into the ashes used for Ash Wednesday. I say this, because I myself didn't know until about two years ago. It's not secret, just not common knowledge. As it turns out, the palm fronds used for Palm Sunday are saved, dried, and burnt to produce the ash which is then blessed by the pastor or priest during the service. Symbolically, it represents our mortality, the dust of the earth, and our sins. We all shuffle on up and receive the mark.

I didn't have palm fronds which had been waved by parishioners eleven months ago. The other problem was that while I am, in fact, charged with sharing the Gospel with others as a minister of Christ, I am not ordained by any serious church and don't have any ecclesiastical powers (as if any mortal here has any power in the other worlds...).

Do you think I let that stop me? Of course not. God knows our hearts. Ritual is good for reminding us and teaching us the various meanings and implications of events and actions, but ultimately, the ritual holds no power either. I don't need palm fronds blessed by a priest in order to do what I wanted. Historically, when Christians have been persecuted, many improvisations have been made. I decided that the best material I could use was one of my church's business cards. I took a saucer and a small lighter outside into the chill morning. After saying a small prayer, I lit it up and poked it so that it didn't scorch the saucer. I then had a film of silvery grey ash. A sharp contrast to the usual black ash that is usually obtained. The other difference was that I could take the time to mark myself properly. A lot of times, at church, all you receive is a simple black smudge since there are many people that need to be marked in a short time span. My mark was hardly elaborate. It was just two lines as you'd expect. They were well formed lines however, and they were properly perpendicular. I set off for work.

When I got there, of course, nobody else was marked. According to roommate V., many Catholic churches hold mass beginning at 6:00 AM to accommodate people before work. That wouldn't have helped me, since I need to start work at 6:30. There were a number of reactions throughout the day. Some of them didn't know what Ash Wednesday was at all, and were only vaguely aware that something comes after Mardi Gras. Some of the the co-workers knew exactly what it meant. One went so far to say "Yeah! Representin'!" That amused me. Then, around 10:00 or so, one of the accountants came over to my cube space to get more information from me about a recent expense report I had submitted. She was also marked; and that made my day.¹

When I got home, V. saw me and asked how mass² was. I told her that mine would happen later in the evening, and of course she asked how I had managed to get my mark before hand. When I told her that it was self-applied, she acted like it was a huge sin that I had committed. How could I have the audacity to mark myself?! Don't I know that I'm just one of the sheep? After she had wandered off, and procrastination had been enjoyed, it was approaching 7:00 PM. I washed my mark off so I could have a proper one applied at the service.

The attendance at the service was terrible. I remember a few years ago, when the Catholic community at UCSD was leasing part of our building from us, the pews were jam packed. Pastor Brian and multiple Catholic priests set up several lines for the application. That was not the case this year. This year we had about 20 or so people in attendance. Everything was conducted with minimal hassle. I came in and opened the bulletin, and lo and behold the Gospel reading was the passage about the pharisees!

---

“Be careful not to display your righteousness merely to be seen by people. Otherwise you have no reward with your Father in heaven. Thus whenever you do charitable giving, do not blow a trumpet before you, as the hypocrites do in synagogues and on streets so that people will praise them. I tell you the truth, they have their reward. But when you do your giving, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, so that your gift may be in secret. And your Father, who sees in secret, will reward you.

“Whenever you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, because they love to pray while standing in synagogues and on street corners so that people can see them. Truly I say to you, they have their reward. But whenever you pray, go into your room, close the door, and pray to your Father in secret. And your Father, who sees in secret, will reward you.

“When you fast, do not look sullen like the hypocrites, for they make their faces unattractive so that people will see them fasting. I tell you the truth, they have their reward. When you fast, put oil on your head and wash your face, so that it will not be obvious to others when you are fasting, but only to your Father who is in secret. And your Father, who sees in secret, will reward you.

“Do not accumulate for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal. But accumulate for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moth and rust do not destroy, and thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also."

---

We also recited a litany of things we shouldn't have done and asked forgiveness. Not loving neighbors as ourselves. Not forgiving others as we've been forgiven. Pride, hypocrisy, and impatience in our lives. Anger at our own frustrations and envy of those more fortunate than us. Intemperate love of worldly good and comforts and our dishonesty in daily life and work. Blindness to human need and suffering. Indifference to injustice and cruelty. False judgments and uncharitable thoughts. Prejudice and contempt toward those who differ from us. Waste and pollution of Creation. It was, after all a literal litany. Such things are cathartic. The sermon was about the nature of repentance³, and the phrase "Homo incurvatis" showed up again! Brian used it to mean the same thing as he did last time, but pronounced it differently this time. This time, he referred to it as "Homo incurvasai". I intend to ask him next time I see him which pronunciation is correct. Eventually, it all ended, and we all returned to our respective homes.

That was my day.

[1]I did experience a brief "Chiros" moment at work today. It wasn't related to today in particular, but it also was good.

[2] People don't understand Protestants. I never go to mass. Ever. It's either "Church" or "Services". But then I have always been a stickler for correct terminology.

[3] It's a new beginning. You won't be flogged, so chin up. It's not really saying "I'm sorry", but rather rededicating one's self to the principle that one is repenting to get.

09:59 pm: I am making beer bread.

I went last night, to the house of a friend for a New Year's party. We brought champaign for obvious reasons, and also Guinness. The Guinness was present because we wanted to try to make a drink we had heard about which involved equal quantities of it and champaign. As it turned out, such a drink was not made, and most of the alcohol came home with us undrunk. (The new year came without much notice. We were watching Free Enterprise at the time.)

Now with a box of Guinness, I recalled a recipe that I had used a while ago which didn't take a whole lot of work. Mix flour, sugar, salt, and baking powder together, and pour in a can of Guinness. One hour later or so, you have a loaf of beer bread. KTimer says I have about 1000 seconds left before it comes out of the oven.

Also, while we're on the subject of New Years, what are all of your resolutions?

10:10 pm: Actual updates!
Yesterday, I had an extremely good day at work. I've been working on a program in C#. All prejudice aside, it's an interesting language. I do have a few complaints about it, but I'll save those for anyone who's interested. So what made yesterday so very good was that in the course of my work, I embedded a Mozilla browser into the code, and it took less effort than I expected it to.

I still don't understand what's _really_ going on here, which is not as I want it. I used the Mozilla ActiveX control created by Adam Lock and available here. Basically it has already been done up to work exactly the same as the IE ActiveX control, so all the work had been done for me. I had embedded an IE browser into the program a month or two prior, but because that didn't use the Sun JRE, I was unable to have that in the final code. (Our output absolutely must use the Sun JRE for technical reasons) The interface was identical, so it turned out to be a matter of just replacing one dll with another. Nevertheless, this was a significant step for me, especially when the code finally functioned exactly as I needed it to in the end. I became very happy.

The other big news around here is that two trees blew over in my apartment complex last night. They smashed no fewer than three cars and did damage to a fourth. It was quite impressive. As I left to go to work this morning, I saw a car that had the front driver's area completely demolished. The car's roof literally was as a smashed soda can. The back window was completely shattered and had broken down to the pebble sized chunks of glass. The car's internal lights were on. The two cars next to it had only smashed windows and windshields.

Then, as I went to work, I saw a number of trees on the Miramar Marine base that had fallen over as well. One of them had taken out a large section of the fence and had disabled a traffic light. Last night must have been extremely heavy winds for so many trees to have fallen on the same evening.

Finally I watched "Supersize Me" tonight with roommates S. and V. What I felt while watching it, I imagine is what a liberal must have felt watching Mr. Moore's little film. It was one sided. I agreed with everything that was presented, even as the intellectual side of me detected the imbalance and complained. Mr. Spurlock did attempt to interview a spokesman for McDonalds, and claimed that he called their media relations department over a dozen times and had sent several supplementary emails. Throughout the entire film though, the only opinion that was remotely from the opposing side was from the President of the Size Acceptance organization. Her interview was only in the bonus material on the DVD.

That said, I feel that it's OK for the movie to be like this because I don't believe there would be any response McDonalds could give that would not be a lie. It was mentioned that shortly after the release of the movie, they universally took the supersize option off of the menu, and introduced a new line of "Premium Salads" to add more nutritious options to them menu. They claim unequivocally that their actions had nothing to do with Spurlock's film.

Again, the goal here is not to have everyone looking like sleek, well-oiled muscle-men and flawless beauty queens. The goal is simply to be healthy. No more, no less. McDonalds food is inherently unhealthy and cannot positively contribute to this goal. No amount of words can change the fat content of their present offerings. Mr. Spurlock was examined by two specialists and a general practitioner and was found to be in excellent health. He consulted nutritionists and exercise specialists and they gave similar glowing reports. After his month of fast food, he had gained 30 pounds, was suffering from mood swings, chest pain, and a whole score of other problems. The general practitioner was telling him to call 911 if the pains went to his jaw or along his arm. Another of his doctors was afraid he might develop jaundice. The message is clear.

If you are obese, you will have a decreased quality of life, and you will die earlier than you would otherwise. This is not an opinion, it is a fact.

I see here that a rebuttal film has been made called "Bowling for Morgan". A man claims to lose 20 pounds in 30 days on a similar McDiet. Seriously though. Could this be any more valid a response than the Celsius 41.11 film produced by the Right in response to Moore?

Anyway, that's the news from my neck of the woods. How's everyone else doing?

07:39 pm: Wombat Speaks!
It has been months since I have posted in my journal. The chief problem is that I find I presently have nothing to say. I have to think of things that I can post.

Anyway. Tonight, for the first time in months. I have something to say.

According to a page defining what constitutes white-tie formal wear, the knot in a bowtie has the same geometry as the knot in your shoelaces.

Thank you.

05:39 pm: Today will be a good day.

The sun isn't even up yet, and I've already compiled and installed OpenOffice for Wynona (my new laptop), got sound working on her, and solved the daily Set puzzle in astonishingly little time (18 seconds is very rare for me). I do admit that I started the compilation process at 2300 last night, and that for most of the night, Wynona did work compiling while I slept. Nevertheless, at exactly 4:22 this morning, she finished, and 36 minutes later, I got up.

Remember, it's all about attitude! Woo!

11:09 pm: So much to write, so little time. Here's a preview of future entries from me.

• Bought a laptop from Fry's. Overall, a bad experience. A letter will be written.
  
• GIF89, what a format! You'll get to hear in painstaking detail, about what a wonderful format it is as I go over what each bit (literally) means.
  
• Thoughts on power and motion.
  

06:21 pm:

06:15 pm: Awwwwwwwww GEEK OUT!
Does anyone have $20,000 I could borrow? I uhm... need to make a tech purchase.

09:22 pm: I'm watching you.

This past week, I got KDE working and looking beautiful. I am ever astounded at just how customizable each and every setting is. Do I want to make this tiny element of the panel shaded, skinned, or partially transparent? After getting the interface just right, surfing and using this machine fills me with the cyber equivalent of fahrfenugen. (Haven't heard that one in a while...) It becomes vaguely unsettling to use Windows simply because it's not Linux. I haven't been bringing my work-laptop home much anymore; usually only on the weekends. In the spirit of Laziness, Impatience, and Hubris, I no longer have to remember to check Livejournal in order to hear of your latest exploits. Below is the small perlscript I hammered out tonight. It figures out the usernames in the set ([Friends] U [Friend Of]) and then retrieves the RSS feed from each journal iff it is newer than the one cached in my server. I have a different script which grabs the entries out of the RSS feeds and passes them through to karamba. Now thanks to the tireless efforts of this alpha grade wombot, I can watch you update your journal on desktop #8 without actually having to push a button or click anywhere.

#!/usr/bin/perl -w
use strict;

if (scalar(@ARGV)==1) {
my $cmd = "wget -q --header=\"UserAgent: Wombot_Alpha, Personal use robot, wombots\@lemniscate.net\" --header=\"If_Modified_Since: " . scalar(localtime) . "\" http://www.livejournal.com/misc/fdata.bml?user=darkwombatdude -O /data/karamba/raw/rss_lj/lj.friends_raw";
system $cmd;
}
elsif (scalar(@ARGV)==0){
my $cmd = "cat /data/karamba/raw/rss_lj/lj.friends_raw | grep -v \"^#\" | grep -v \"^\$\" | tr -d \"<> \" | sort | uniq > /data/karamba/raw/rss_lj/lj.friends";
system $cmd;
open (FRIENDS, "/data/karamba/raw/rss_lj/lj.friends") or die "Can't open the friends list.\n$!\n";
while(<FRIENDS>){
chomp;
my @fileattr = stat "/data/karamba/raw/rss_lj/$_.rss";
unless (@fileattr) {
$fileattr[9] = 0;
}
$cmd = "wget -q --header=\"UserAgent: Wombot_Alpha, Personal use robot, wombots\@lemniscate.net\" --header=\"If_Modified_Since: " . scalar(localtime($fileattr[9])) . "\" http://www.livejournal.com/users/$_/data/rss.html -O /data/karamba/raw/rss_lj/$_.rss";
system $cmd;
}
close FRIENDS;
}

(No, I didn't forget the friends-only entries. The one that I really use also sends my login cookie as an additional header.)

11:51 pm: You may have seen this before. Or you may have not.

http://www.albinoblacksheep.com/flash/alien.php

Alien, in 30 seconds, performed by bunnies.