Merry Christmas!

If you didn't get anything you liked today, here is a game to alleviate your boredom.

My Mouse

My middle daughter was in the Nutcracker this past weekend. She had a blast.




In the end, we had one tired mouse...

Geography Quiz

Take a geography quiz, and see if you can beat my score.

BTW, this is the first time I took this. If you take it again, the states are given in random order.

HINT: when you are wrong, it shows you in red where the state should be. Drag the state into the red area to proceed to the next state.

Kids say the darndest things

Some kids (ages 10 to 13) were exposed to the video games we played as youth, and their reactions were recorded.
It's pretty funny, especially the one where the kid complains that Tetris is too boring, cause the blocks don't explode. Here's the link.

R U Racist?

The story that this article accompanied was saying that unconscious or implicit racism was still rampant in the US.
Here's a test to see if you are unconsciously racist.
https://implicit.harvard.edu/implicit/demo/selectatest.jsp
Then choose the "Race IAT"
After some of you post your results, I'll tell you what it said about me.

THE SCREAM

I'm sure you've seen Mrs. Wbobth's final animation project by now. If you haven't, here's the link. Anyway, I was in charge of doing the sound for the project (yes, the world map AND the Sherlock Holmes papers are MORE than paid off) and I needed a crowd screaming when they encountered the hot dog. So, I recorded everyone in the family screaming. I used this awesome free sound editing software called Audacity to do all the mixing and fading. Anyhow, Wiffle (my sister) and the author of the hot dog story came over one night, and I displayed what I had so far, and I was explaining that I needed some more screams. So, Mr. E took his best stab at a scream, and scared the living crap out of me and my sister. We were NOT expecting what we heard. Anyhow, here's a link to THE SCREAM.

Peter Boyle, R.I.P.

Peter Boyle is dead at age 71.
He was the guy who played the father on Everyone Loves Raymond.
The other notable part he played was the monster in Mel Brooks' 1974 classic film Young Frankenstein.
If you've never seen this movie, it is a must see. I nearly peed my pants laughing when Dr. Frankenstein and his monster creation did a song and dance number and the monster shouts "Puttin' on the Ritz!"

3 Million?

3 Million bees removed from couples' apartment.

I uninstalled IE7

Actually, I used the System Restore utility to take my system back to the day before I installed IE7 just to make sure it REALLY got it.
It broke our Movie Maker which was pretty much a deal breaker, since we have been using it so much. If I really want tabs, I'll go with Firefox.

Howly crapolla

I can't believe someone can actually do this.
Wonder how many broken bones the guy got learning how to do this.

You know you're a redneck when...

Your bike has been in your front yard for so long that the tree is hugging it.

Macromedia killer?

Looks like Micro$oft is working the the Macromedia Dreamweaver suite replacement.
It's called Expression Studio.
http://www.microsoft.com/products/expression/en/expression-studio/default.mspx
It has a web designer (similar to Dreamweaver), something that looks like it can do what Flash does, and a graphic designer programer similar to Fireworks or Freehand.
'Twill be interesting to see if it takes off.

He Shoots!

He Scores!

Internet Explorer 7

I installed IE7 on our main home computer just to check it out.
It features a redesigned interface, tabbed browsing like Firefox, an RSS feed button so you can monitor all your favorite blogs.
The only thing bad so far is somehow it broke our Windows Movie Maker.
Here's a screenshot.

(click to enlarge)

Some cool videos

Amazing ping pong...the guy does a somersault and still gets the ball.



Bottle music


Worlds best beatboxer

OK...I'm a geek

I like Fractals. I like them so much that I wrote a program to generate Fractal images with the ability to change the color scheme and animate them.

This is the same fractal image with 3 different color schemes applied.

Blue bug.

Cool Yellow.

Ugh. Headache...


The same fractal zoomed in.


and here's an animation.

Nuclear Holocaust

After all the atomic bombs have finished falling, the only thing that will be left on Earth are ants, cockroaches, and statues of Ronald McDonald asking us if we're lovin' it .

Perks of being the Emperor of the Galaxy

Great view.


Fantastic Dental.


All the lightning you want.


And your very own bottomless pit right in the middle of your office.

Funny Anecdote

How true this is...

A man in a hot air balloon is lost. He sees a man on the ground and reduces height to speak to him.
"Excuse me, can you tell me where I am?"
"You're in a hot air balloon hovering thirty feet above this field," comes the reply.
"You must work in Information Technology," says the balloonist.
"I do," says the man, "How did you know?"
"Well," says the balloonist, "Everything you told me is technically correct, but it's no use to anyone."
"You must be in business," says the man.
"I am," says the balloonist, "How did you know?"
"Well," says the man, "You don't know where you are, you don't know where you're going, but you expect me to be able to help. You're in the same position you were before we met, but now it's my fault."

JJA #4 - Reception

From Harrisburg, they flew me to Fort Jackson, South Carolina for Basic Training. Now, in the movies, they show recruits arriving only to immediately encounter their screaming drill sergeant immediately. Well, in reality, they have to do some housekeeping before you can meet your drill sergeants.

This is called Reception.

I think I spent a total of 3 or 4 days in Reception.

They had us spent alot of time on "the mat".



They would have us wait here between the different stations that we needed to visit.




Some of the things they had us do here was get a haircut.


And yes, they actually made us pay $4 for it. The barbers were so fast that they cut one guys forehead while moving the shaver towards his head.



They also gave us all of our immunizations here. This was a very interesting experience. They used no needles for the shots. They had these hydraulic pressure guns that squirted the medicine in a high-pressure stream so that it would pierce your skin. They warned us not to flinch while getting the shots, otherwise we would have a gash in our arm. I got 3 shots in one arm, and 2 in the other. I saw some of the other guys flinch...





Then came the best shot. I think they stored this thing in the refrigerator, because the medicine was VERY cold. It was also so thick that it took 30 seconds to get it all in you. And they gave it to you in your butt.



Here was where we had to relinquish our civilian clothes and go all military. They took away everything that you brought with you, except your toiletry bag. They gave us new everything down to brown Army underwear that didn't quite fit, and horrible itchy hot green wool socks.

The elastic band of the underwear was so unelastic that a week into basic training it had cut into my sides so I had perpetual raw skin around my waist.


Here's a photo of the clothes line.




The boots also did not fit very well.

During the course of Basic Training, I got blisters on my feet. Then I got blisters on top of my blisters. Then I got blisters on top of those. To this day, I have large pads of skin on my toes where I got those blisters that were not there before the Army.




The guys who wore glasses had to give up their civilian glasses, and get Army issue glasses. We called them BCGs, or Birth Control Glasses. They made you so ugly that, well, you get the idea.


One other memorable experience from my time in Reception was the acclimatization process. There was record heat that summer in South Carolina, and right before I arrived, someone on post had died from heat stroke.
So they made us drink, and drink, and drink more water. 1 quart per hour if I recall correctly. I never peed so much in my life. They made us drink so much that one guy puked water all over the floor in front of me. No chunks, just water.

Next stop - Basic Training!

Google Targeted Ads

I love my G-Mail. Don't know what I would do without it.

However, today I got an invitation to a Christmas Party. Actually the verbage was "Annual Holiday Luncheon." So, what does Google think I would be interested in?

My Day Off

I took the day off so I could watch the kids while the Mrs. was taking a spinning class. She went with her friend who is teaching her how to spin raw wool into yarn.
I figured I would use the day to get some some much needed chores done. I woke up around 6-ish to help the Mrs get her grandmother's old spinning wheel into the van so she could use it for her class.
After the girls got up, I decided that we would make some Chicken corn soup together. I set the girls to shredding carrots in our Pampered Chef cheese grater(works wonderfully!), while I chopped onion and prepared the rest of the ingredients. The girls were thrilled. They really like cooking with Daddy.

Afterwards, I went to buy some tires. I made this decision last week while hydroplaning down the road during the rainstorm we had.
So, I go to the tire place, and while I'm waiting the hour or so for the car to be done, the kids and I walk over to the used video game store to browse around. The boy has been saving up work dollars towards a new video game, so he cashed those in.
After that, we walked down to the fabric store to let the girls peruse around. I am always amazed at what girls get excited over. They were both oohing and aahing over the different fabrics, how pretty they were, how they would like to make jammies out of this fabric, or how cute the hearts were on another fabric while The Boy was hollering about how bored he was. I reminded him that the girls were bored in the video game store.
We also went to Kmart, and looked through the girls clothes rack, and the toy aisle.
Cell phone rang. Car's done. 350 smackeroos. Back to home. Car feels wonderful. I must've needed tires for a while.
This is turning out to be an expensive day.
In the evening, we had parent teacher conferences. The Mrs had not yet made it back from her class, so I went to meet the teachers.
Middle girl's conference was first. She is doing fantastic. A few problems with counting money, but nothing that can't be helped with a little practice. It was a very short conference. "You're daughter's perfect. Any questions?" :)
Then I get to The Boy's conference.
Academically, everything is stellar. Behavior-wise, well...you know. Read Mrs. Wbobth's blog to read the history of The Boy. He is having crying sessions in class when given writing assignments because he doesn't know what to write. I can't be too hard on him, because I also hated those free form writing assignments that the teachers gave. On the other hand I don't think writing about your favorite Thanksgiving food should be a crying matter...
I didn't manage to get to what I really wanted to do, which was clean the basement.
Now I need to rest from my day off...

Take the "A" Train

The boy is learning Swing drumming.
Here is his progression of a new beat over 3 days of practice.
I'm impressed.

$160,000 fungus

A truffle was recently auctioned off for about 160 grand. I can't imagine paying that much for some fungus.
But you know what they say. Once you've tasted it once, it grows on you...

Fighting Army Style #4 - Caption Competition

OK, blogosphere! I need YOU to come up with a good caption for this one.





A couple of my ideas:
1. Soldiers outfitted with Depends for when they crap their pants in battle.
2. Brave soldier given task of cleaning Cyclops ear with specially designed Q-Tip.
3. Here's the body armor our troops should be using.

The future of photos?

Here's a link to something called Photosynth, put out by Microsoft.
It's in pre-beta stage right now, but what it basically does is scan through your photos looking for similarities, and extrapolates a 3D montage allowing you to "walk" through your photos.

They also recommend 1 Gig of RAM to run the demo.

Seems interesting...we'll see where it goes.

My awesome wife

She is taking this animation class which is taught in Flash.
Here is her latest project. (I helped out with the Russian and the globe)

Election Selection 06

Forget those pompous political pundits on TV.
Wbobth has everything you need to make an informed selection this election season.
All you need are the signs you see along the highway.

Can't...walk...any...more...

Yesterday was the parents vs. kids soccer game. I may have mentioned before that I am extremely unathletic. Of the 7 parents that were on the team, 5 were soccer coaches, 1 evidently was a soccer star back in Scotland in his youth...and then there was me. I think this was the first full soccer game I ever played in my life. So I let the other guys do stuff like try to get the ball into the goal. I hung back and played defense. My only strategy was to run as fast as the kid and get in the way of them getting a clear shot on the goal. This strategy worked pretty well until I realized that I could only sprint once every 5 minutes or so. By the end of the hour, I was so tired that a 5 yr old dribbling the ball towards me got past me, and I couldn't catch up.
So this morning I got up, and I let out a howl as pain shot through my body as I went to put my pants on. Everything is painful...getting in and out of the car, climbing stairs, watching TV...
Anyway, I did have fun. The boy had a blast. And I'm getting used to the taste of Advil.
Oh, yeah...the kids won.

Animation Idea

Mrs. Wbobth is doing a project for her animation class that she is taking this semester. The instructions stated that she needed to animate a(n) historical event. After much thought, she decided to do an animation of the Alexei Leonov performing the first space walk.

Too bad she didn't decide to do Laika, the first dog in space.

Windows Trivia

Over on the right I have a link to "The Old New Thing" which is a blog maintained by a guy who has been on the Windows programming team from I think the Windows 3.x days. Anyway, here is an interesting set of links I gleaned out of his archives of useless Windows trivia and interesting anecdotes.

Why are there 2 copies of Notepad?

Why is the registry called a hive?

Why does Windows 95 have functions called BEAR, BUNNY and PIGLET?

I'll take one of everything

Twenty foot long computer

Do not underestimate the power of the game Deer Hunter

Actual Death Threat

An insight into the Windows 95 startup sound

What is this Xerox directory doing in Program Files?

Windows Annoyances - Useless dialog boxes

Whenever you try to open a file that does not have a program associated with the extension of the file, this dialog pops up.




The default option is to "Use the Web Service" to help you out. Has anyone ever actually used this Web Service? Well, today was my lucky day. I wanted to find out what would happen.



When I hit OK, it directed me to this web page:





Now, this is telling me "I have no clue what your file is." No duh, you told me that on the other dialog box. Now, look at the options that this gives me.
It's telling me to go to yet another website, which (I'm sure) will still not tell me what to do with my stinkin' file.
Better yet, one of the suggestions is "UK Technical support".
HUH??!?!
If I were a novice user, and I were presented with this page, I would be more confused than ever.

In general, the only program I use to open unrecognized file types is Notepad.
I'm sure there is no way to set that as my default, and Microsoft forces me to go through a completely meaningless step to do what I want to.

Those crazy Russians

You know your winters are too long when ice bathing is a national pasttime.

Death by butt

This chick is dead due to having one too many butts. Read about it here.

Reminds me of our 6 toed cat that couldn't climb trees. We named him "Fweek". I remember one time Fweek got freaked out, and instinctively went to climb a tree, and landed on his back.

Good riddance?!?

Some of you may have been shocked and dismayed by my callous attitude over the demise of an unfortunate pigeon in the gullet of a pelican.
Although this story probably belongs in the JJA series, I will enlighten you as to where this desire to see all pigeons suffer comes from.

It happened while I was at the Defense Language Institute in Monterey, California. The barracks we stayed in were quite lovely. The barracks buildings had Spanish tile on the roof, there were two person rooms, each with its own bathroom, a common area on each floor with lounge furniture, and each floor had a small balcony so you could stand outside if you wished.
Being the Army, cleanliness of everything and especially maintainance of the facilities took a very high precedence. We all had responsibilities to keep the grounds neat and clean.
One day, we were cleaning, and we notice that a pigeon had built a nest on our balcony. As I go to shoo the pigeon away, and get rid of the nest, Specialist G (who shall be known just as Specialist G to protect the innocent) rushed up and demanded to know what I was doing.
First, a few words about Specialist G.
She was one of the few people who had been at DLI forever. She was a student, but she had gotten through some portion of the language class, contracted some illness that made her unable to attend class, so she just kind of hung around not really doing much...other than try to save pigeons.
I replied to Specialist G that I was shooing the pigeon away because it was messing up our balcony. She was so adamant that the pigeon should stay, that she went to our platoon sergeant with the case for why the pigeon should stay on our balcony. AND HE AGREED WITH HER!!!
Now, this is the Army. The Army that trains its soldiers to kill people. And the Army that has mascot pigeons roosting on the balconies of its barracks.
So we watched the pigeon lay its eggs, and nurture its young. And poop. And poop some more. And poop and poop and poop. By the time the pigeon raised it young, and abandoned its nest in search of another balcony to poop on, our balcony looked like a winter wonderland.
And who ended up cleaning up the entire balcony by himself????
Private Mitchell. Not Specialist G.
I hate pigeons.

Fighting Army Style #3

Kick em in the uh-uh!


1. While your opponent is flying in the towards you with his awesome HIIIYAAA flying side kick, calmly catch his foot.
2. Kick him in the uh-uh.


1. Stand in your stupid side guard position.
2. While your opponent is staring off into space, telegraph your intentions with a really big windup.
3. Hopefully your opponent does not notice the trajectory of your foot going towards...
4. Kick him in the uh-uh.
5. Laugh and gloat as your opponent doubles over in pain. Good job soldier.

1. While your opponent is standing in the stupidest position possible with a bayonet pointed at YOUR uh-uh...
2. Single handedly grab his rifle while he does nothing to prevent it.
3. Continue to stand there with one hand on your opponents rifle confident that he cannot get away from your steely grip. Laugh to yourself knowing what you are about to do.
4. Kick him in the uh-uh.
5. While your opponent is stunned, go for the ultra-deadly kick to the knee.

Mr. Pelican has a snack

Click here to read the description of the pigeon struggling to get away from the pelican.
Good riddance...

All I want for Christmas...

So, the girls decided to start writing their Christmas list already. The older one is taking dictation from the younger one, since the younger one can't write. So, this is what I found laying on the dining room table this evening. Perhaps I won't get them EVERYTHING they want on their list...

Like Father, LIke Son

So I get home from work today, go into the kitchen, and there is a dead mouse in a trap near the dishwasher. Of course, the kids need to see, so I holler upstairs for everyone to come see the dead mouse. Middle daughter exclaims "Ooooh, you got another one daddy!!!" Then, when I thought about it, I didn't remember setting a trap there. That is when son pipes up and says "I set the trap today. I baited it with crumbs from the toaster oven." Aaaaaaah, That's my boy!!!

Mouse Hunter Extraordinaire Jr.

Mouse Hunter Extraordinaire

Since the weather became colder, we have had some unwelcome guests in our house...mice. We first discovered them because we have a drop ceiling in our kitchen (thanks to the previous owners) and I heard them skritching along above the ceiling tiles one evening squeaking all the way. Blecchhhhh. So when I get a chance i pick up some mouse hunting supplies at the local hardware store. I put peanut butter on some traps and place it by the spots that I suspect the mice are getting into our kitchen. The first night I caught 1 mouse. That was good. It was a dumb mouse and fell for the peanut butter trick right away. However, we had (at least) one other mouse that has eluded capture. I tried glue boards, I tried the peanut butter trick...the kids even suggested that I put bread on the traps since they seem to like that as well. I even tried to put a trap in the ceiling tiles, but there is not enough space between the ceiling tile and the ceiling to let the trap spring.
The mouses luck ran out....TONIGHT!!!! HAAAHAHAHHAAA!

I was sitting in the quiet evening house when I thought I heard pans rattling under the stove.
Oh No, I thought...its living under the stove in our pots!!! BLEEEEEECH!

So I run over to the stove, and pull out the thing under the stove. Nothing.
I move some pots around, and I see the mouse running frantically away. In its panic it couldn't jump high enough to get out of the box. Perhaps it use the pots to get up before, because at this point I had most of the pots out of the thingy. So, hoping it would not jump out, I ran and grabbed one of my set traps with PB on it, and placed it in the stove compartment where the mouse was. When mice aren't stressed, they can avoid the traps, but when they panic, they tend to ignore caution. So I got the broom, and started stabbing at the mouse to make it run around. Sure enough, after 30 seconds, it stepped on the trap. As it took its last breath, I tossed it in the trash can...
Trash day is tomorrow.

P.S. Now I'm washing every pan under our stove.

TV of the Future

Expendability

Communism works

Satellite view of the Korean Peninsula at night. The big splotch below the line is Seoul. The little dot above the line is N. Korea's capital, Pyonyang. No doubt the lights in the North are the amusement park on the Dear Leader's compound...

Bloatware?

Windows Vista, the next Operating System from Microsoft will require a whopping 15 GB of free hard drive space to install. Here's a nice little graph of space requirements for various versions of Windows.


Raw Data (I'm not sure what is causing the extra space...apologies):

Win 95	55 MB
Win NT	110 MB
Win 2000	650 MB
Win XP	1500 MB
2003 server	2500 MB
Windows Vista	15000 MB

Yummy cookies

Mrs. Wbobth brought home some cookies today. I'm excited!!!

JJA #3 - Shipping out

Well, the long year wait was over, and all I needed to do was go. From what I recall, the recruiter gave me a report date, but it was actually before my high school graduation. I think my mom called to complain, and my report date magically moved to 3 days after graduation. June 21, 1993. I reported to the local high school bright and early and the recruiters drove us to Harrisburg for stage 1 of our inprocessing. 2 notable events happened while I was at Harrisburg: the big lie that I mentioned in a previous story, and the physical.

The Big Lie
I had already signed my enlistment papers a year prior. However, when I got to Harrisburg, they told me that my job required a 5 year enlistment. So, they ripped up my 4 year commitment paper, and had me sign a 5 year commitment. I was too naive/lazy to protest so I went with it. In hindsight I should have protested. When I got to language school NOONE had a 5 year enlistment. I was the only one.

The Physical
This was actually quite a funny experience. Imagine 60 guys in their underwear duckwalking around a big room. Part of the physical was making sure that everyone had a full range of motion in all of their limbs and joints. They had us do other weird things like hold our hands out and flick our fingers. I don't know how the Army was in the years past, but at least they didn't make us do the "turn your head and cough" in front of everyone else there. So they called us one by one into the doctors office for the more personal exam. The doctor was a small oriental man who had an accent. After examining the front parts, he needed to look in the trunk, so he said the phrase I will remember for the rest of my life: "BENN OHVAH AN SUPWHEDD YAWW TSEEEK". I winced expecting a finger, but thankfully none came (that happened later in my Army career and will be the subject of a future blog post).

After Harrisburg, they flew us to Basic Training.
Next stop: Arrival at Ft. Jackson.
Stay tuned!

Mmmm....Haggis

Thank the folks over at the Deep End Dining blog for this recipe.

HAGGIS
* 1 sheep's lung (illegal in the U.S.; may be omitted if not available)
* 1 sheep's stomach
* 1 sheep heart
* 1 sheep liver
* 1/2 lb fresh suet (kidney leaf fat is preferred)
* 3/4 cup oatmeal (the ground type, NOT the Quaker Oats type!)
* 3 onions, finely chopped
* 1 teaspoon salt
* 1 teaspoon freshly ground pepper
* 1/2 teaspoon cayenne
* 1/2 teaspoon nutmeg
* 3/4 cup stock
Wash lungs and stomach well, rub with salt and rinse. Remove membranes and excess fat. Soak in cold salted water for several hours.
Turn stomach inside out for stuffing.

Cover heart and liver with cold water. Bring to a boil, reduce heat, cover and simmer for 30 minutes.
Chop heart and coarsely grate liver.
Toast oatmeal in a skillet on top of the stove, stirring frequently, until golden.
Combine all ingredients and mix well.
Loosely pack mixture into stomach, about two-thirds full.
Remember, oatmeal expands in cooking.

Press any air out of stomach and truss securely. Put into boiling water to cover. Simmer for 3 hours, uncovered, adding more water as needed to maintain water level.
Prick stomach several times with a sharp needle when it begins to swell; this keeps the bag from bursting.
Place on a hot platter, removing trussing strings. Serve with a spoon.
Ceremoniously served with "neeps, tatties and nips" -- mashed turnips, mashed potatoes, nips of whiskey.
....
Yeah, you'd need to whiskey to keep from passing out when you ate it.
Also, check out the stinky tofu review. Its worth the read.

I'm famous too

This post is in response to Wbobth's Moms blog entry that she is famous. Well, I just have to prove that I am well known on the Internet too. She might have a video, but I have this.
(BTW, I have nooooooo idea how this got there. I must have uploaded this to a BBS when I was 14 or something.)

Fighting Army Style - #2

First, we need to continue to learn how to stand before we go on to more advanced moves.

Right and Left Guard.
(BTW, you can click on the pictures to get the full sized view)


This text is taken verbatim from the manual:

Football Kick
a. Objective and use. The object of the football kick is to deliver a powerful kick to a vulnerable area anywhere on the body. It is used best when the opponent is on the ground but not close enough or in the correct position for a heel stomp. (Heel stomp described below.)
b. Description.
To deliver the football kick step close to your opponent, facing him.[ed. best not done backwards]
Plant your non-kicking foot firmly so you can maintain your balance.
When you kick with the other foot swing it to the rear and bend the knee. As you swing the kicking foot forward from the hip, straighten your knee and keep the foot close to the ground. The toe is pointed toward your opponent for maximum force.
Snap the leg forward as if kicking a football.


Heel Stomp
Objective and Use.
The purpose of the heel stomp is to dull the opponent's senses by a blow to the head or other vital area. This stomp is used best when the opponent is lying on the ground.
[ed. Who woulda thunk it? The Army is telling us to kick them while they are down.]
Description.
To execute the stomp you must be standing over the portion of the body you wish to stomp. Pull the knee up and flex the ankle as much as possible. To stomp, straighten out the knee forcefully, striking your opponent with the back edge of the boot. Attempt to drive your heel into the ground to insure that the full force of the kick is delivered to your oppnent.

In the full sized pitcures, notice the little ouch marks they put on the guys face.
Thats all for now!

Football?

Yes, I played football.
Yes, you may laugh.
(That's my cousin Gary, BTW)