Category: tech

Talk about software, hardware, electronics, and a myriad of other sex-repellent topics.

Posted on

drop bricks on our hot wheels

I have the power.
Saw the music industry sued another 500 downloaders today, sucks to be them. But for really guys, if you’re still using some kind of crappy centralized P2P app – what can you expect? Last night I stayed up until 1am for no apparent reason. I was ripping CDs and listening to the results, and writing like I am now. Tonight I went on a solo run around 10pm, so now I’ve got some juice keeping me awake.

Ben and I were talking today about all the toys we used to play with as kids, and which ones were our favorites. I think the whole conversation started around Legos, as we were both discussing the large tupperware container of random Legos we had as kids. You know, it was a jumbled mess of your standard primary-color Legos, some brown pirate-ship ones, and maybe some gray moonbase-five ones as well. My brother and I could have hours of fun with Legos. We’d dump out that tupperware container into a huge pile, and build crap for hours.

Also ranking mutually high on our lists were G.I. Joe, He-Man, and Transformers. I guess those were just the toys to have back then. I remember getting Castle Greyskull for Christmas the same year my brother got Skull Mountain. We had a lot of cool toys. The Rancor, the Millennium Flacon, the self-destructing Ewok-carrying Speederbike, an X-wing with popup R2D2 action, Ewok Village. Shoot, I think I was the only kid in town who had the Tundertank. I also had some ridiculously unpractical Transformers moonbase-robot-train thing, which was utterly stupid as a toy. The key to toys isn’t more motors and assembly, any idiot knows kids gravitate towards the most rock-simple concepts when it comes to toys. At least, in my day we did. I don’t know about these Poke-Digi kids of today? but give me a sticky spider thing that crawls down walls or a slingshot, and I’m good to go.

We also agreed that whoever thought of the whole “crack-ups” gimmick was a genius. If you don’t know what I’m talking about, crack-ups (or maybe it was crash-’ems) were Hot Wheels cars that had spring-loaded sections which would rotate quickly upon impact to show a “wrecked” version of the car. You could roll a normal looking car at a wall and the little rollover portion would switch to a fake dented hood or something. Pretty soon the rollover-change thing made it’s way into other toys like Battle Armor He-Man and such. Anyway, what a brilliant idea. Boys love to wreck their toys. My brother and I used to drop bricks on our Hot Wheels anyway, just to wreck them. Who was the genius who was smart enough to realize that a perpetually wreckable car would be a boys dream? Wish I woulda thought of it.

I’m outta here.

Posted on

the tortoise that is my metabolism

It's a spare tire, y'know.. like because I'm fat and stuff.
Man, I seem to be getting more and more e-mail about my Pac Man cabinet every day. I guess as more sites link to mine, and I move up the Google ranks, the more hits I get. Right now my site is the 4th return in a Google for “pac man cocktail,” which ain’t bad at all. I think, of all my self-maintaining sites, it’s the one I’m most proud of. I feel like I actually “completed” it, didn’t leave it hanging like I often do. I mean, out of all my websites – the blog is the one I’m the most happy with, since I’m really happy I’ve kept up with it? and I feel like I might even have a small semi-dedicated readership. Thanks y’allz.

Sitting here listening to the Byrds’ “Mr. Tambourine Man” from 1965. So yeah, the GDM project is up to the By’s at this point. I haven’t been updating the database on the webpage, mostly because I haven’t been 100% diligent in testing all the resulting rips – but I am making some fo rilla progress on getting through the collection. The 120GB RAID array is nearly a quarter full. Dang I gotta take a dump right now, I’ll be right back?

One of my Taiwan customers sent me an awesome little gift the other day. I love this thing. When I was in Taiwan last, I picked up a similar USB pendrive MP3 player and it died immediately after I brought it onto US soil. Was a waste of $60 and didn’t have FM or voice-record features like this MSI one I now have. I gotta admit, the little thing sounds pretty dang good – and the volume goes loud enough so I can hear it over the lawn mower, which is one of the few times I use it. I know it’s no iPod at only 128MB, but hey – if it’s enough for the 1st four Led Zeppelin albums? who really needs anything more? For real though, it’s perfect for yardwork, running, hiking, camping, and any other short-term activity than can be enhanced with tunes. With a 2-4 album capacity at a decent bitrate, it works for me. Even if my albums run out, I could turn to that God-forsaken form of media-indoctrination they call FM radio? but of course that’d be this indie-diehard’s last option.

So hey, three paragraphs and nothing interesting yet – I’m back! Maybe I’ve finally shaken the shame of this terrible streak of writer’s block and settled for mediocre documentation of my daily crap. I’m gonna write about nothing and like it. For real though, I’d like to write something good again – the last thing that even came close was the Satan-flier thing? the coded-best-friend’s-sister-letters thing just didn’t really do it for me. Shit, am I all storied out? I got more right?

Been running roughly every other night, in a serious effort to try and lose some of my fat ass. That’s right, I want to lose some of me and never find it again. I’m talking like 80lbs of me? and that’s a lot. Anyway, every other night I lumber my hefty ass around the block a couple times to try and get the tortoise that is my metabolism to step it up a notch. I’ve been flirting with the whole “eating right” gig too, but been making slower progress on that aspect of it. I mean, my body has been in a slow state of atrophy for nigh on 15 years now? so it’s gonna be slow going. So, I’m really trying? maybe then I can get some friggin’ pants that fit or something. Being fat sucks, so I gotta work on it. Between working in the yard and running, maybe I can at least sweat out a pound or two. Wish me luck.

Well, it’s now officially Wednesday morning – and I have no idea what I’m still doing up. Listening to some 1967 Neil Young demos for the 2nd Buffalo Springfield album and writing. Because I feel bad about not writing something more awesomer, here’s a scanned in note I got from Sharaun in 1993. She’s talking about a mutual friend of ours, Heather – who would, ironically, later on become one of the “indiscretions” that led to our 9-month lost weekend. See, we really have been dating since high school? eerie. (The spelling errors were a running joke between us, man we were nerds).

Dave out.

Posted on

you did it

Where my droogs at?
Sitting here ripping my CD collection, listening to some great stuff that I haven’t heard in years. Tonight we’re on the Bs. We listened to everything from Ben Folds Five to Black Sabbath to Badfinger. Sometimes I’m torn between wanting to write every detail of my daily stuff and wanting to write down stuff from the olden days. Sometimes olden days are more fun.

One day I was playing “doctor” with the girl from next door. I must have been in the 5th grade. It was her, my brother, and me – and we were hiding out between our two houses. My mom was out and about somewhere, and my dad was home. Since we were so young, I really had no idea how to play doctor – I just think I wanted to see something I’d never seen before. We were in the middle of the proceedings, and the little neighbor girl was in a compromising position – when my mom drove down the street on her way home. The picture looking out the car window must’ve been pretty telling. Two boys and the neighbor huddled in the corner between the houses, she’s striking some unnatural pose or lifting something that shouldn’t be lifted? while the two boys look on intently.

We saw mom drive by, and immediately canceled the game of doctor. I think my brother and I headed home, hoping that mom wouldn’t suspect us. Bad news for us, the neighbor told her mom about the new game she played with the brothers from next door. Bummer. While my mom was in the living room talking to the neighbor’s mom, I put my plan into action.

I went into my brother’s room, and told him “you were playing doctor with that girl.” “No I wasn’t, you were,” he replied. “No, you did it,” I answered. Then, without giving him enough time to answer – I kept drilling it into him. “You did it!” “You did it!” “You did it!” “You did it!” Over and over and over and over again. Finally he stopped protesting and started crying. “I did it,” he whimpered through tears. “That’s right, now go tell mom.” And, he did. He went out and told mom that he was the one who was playing doctor with the girl.

Never have I been more ashamed of my treatment towards my brother. I’m sorry Frank. I know you didn’t play doctor with that girl. Oh, and I’m also sorry I brainwashed you into “admitting” you were the one who scribbled all over the toilet seat with mom’s mascara – I know it was me. I’m also sorry I threw the cat on you while you were taking a bath, and that I shot model rocket engines at you out of a homemade PVC pipe “bazooka.” Oh man, no wonder?

OK, so I posted Thursday’s and Friday’s at the same time. Sue me, Dave out.

Posted on

are you her dad?

This picture in no way means I'm about to be a dad..
Ahh.. only two days into the GDM project and already I’m discovering some problems. I decided to make doubly sure all my rips were perfect and error free, so I did some more random sampling of the albums ripped so far. What got me thinking was the behavior of the cd-r/w drive that I’ve been using to rip the discs. It’s been getting “hung up” when I put new discs in, almost like it’s having trouble reading them. That got me a little paranoid, so I started checking songs. Sure enough, there were bad rips in there. Some albums were ripped so bad that it made listening impossible. I had to start from scratch again using my dvd-r/w drive as the ripping source. I’ve also downloaded some tools to check MP3s for errors, so I can run a quick “check” after each album is ripped. It’s not perfect, however, since I found at least one error it didn’t by listening. So, the quality-control on this effort has to be top-notch or I could end up with a bunch of useless MP3s with no source to revert to. Changed my encoder too, yippee. It’s all on the page.

The other day I went up to Anthony’s daughter’s school to check out some big production all the 6th graders were doing for their “country reports.” They set up the auditorium with big props from their countries, and served regional foods from those countries. It was cool. Near the end of the event, Brontë was hanging out with Sharaun and I and one of her friends came up and started talking to us. At some point, she turned to me and asked “Are you her dad?” Now, it didn’t hit me at the time – I simply said “No.” But? am I her dad?! For real guys, I must be totally old if kids are mistaking me for the father of a 6th grader. Maybe it’s the thinning hair, or the way I carry myself with so much authority. Ugh? whatever, I’m totally old.

I was pumped to get the news today that the house appraisal came back extremely positive. The refi closes this month and then we get back $400/mo. Sheesh that’s gonna help with the house. It’s time to work on getting some furniture, finishing the backyard, painting, getting some pictures for the wall, and all other sorts of domestic-like projects that we’ve been to destitute to get into.

This has been a mediocre week for the blog. Lackluster entries that are short and not fun to read. Sorry. I guess I’ve been preoccupied with other stuff. We’re no longer going down to Chowchilla today, so I have the weekend to do some sprinkler prep.

Grateful Dead on 3wk, “… Jack Straw from Wichita…” Dave out.

Posted on

urticarian inklings

Still one of the best albums of this past year, I'm listening to it again.

I’m totally going to the doctor. Beginning last Wednesday, I started getting all blotchy-red and itchy at seemingly random times. At first I noticed it early in the morning on the way to work, now I’ve pinpointed it as coming on with temperature change. Every time I go inside from outside, get out of the shower or get wet going wakeboarding – my skin turns mottled red, and I itch like crazy. If I scratch, it only gets worse. Sometimes there are hives, but mostly it’s just the rash. It’s been consistently happening several times a day for over a week now – and I’m getting tired of it. WebMD wasn’t too helpful, other than suggesting it might be the HepB (don’t you die from that?), so maybe the doc can help me out. I’m sure he’ll just be baffled and give me some antihistamines, I have no faith in general practitioners.

I made some good headway in the GDM project last night, setting up the 120GB RAID1 array and ripping several discs. I’ve been spot-checking the resulting MP3 copies to make sure they’re not funky, and I’ve been totally impressed with the quality of the rips. I’m using the Radium-hacked Fraunhoffer Group codec instead of LAME, since I like it a little better. I expect the first batch sale to happen sometime next week.

Speaking of next week, I looked at making reservations for the semi-impromptu overnight trip to Yosemite – and of course all the campsites in the entire park are full that night. I swear, finding a campsite there come April is near impossible. We’re gonna take our chances with the walk-in camping in the valley. It’s first come first served, so we’ll have to roll in pretty early. But at $5/night per person, and up to 6 people per spot – it’s perfect for what we need. I think we can arrive early enough to snag a spot.

Seems I’ve hit a sore spot with my parents with my kind-hearted jab at them in the Cast page bio for my in-laws. Apparently they saw that write up when I linked it from an earlier blog this week and were shocked by my referencing them as the “AV club” compared to Sharaun’s folks. Well, first I had to explain to them that by calling them the “AV club” I meant they were nerds, you know – the Audio-Visual club from high school? Anyway, my mom wrote me an e-mail defending her coolness – and my dad called me admitting his nerdiness but telling me that mom was cool. I guess that’s right, my dad’s the true nerd. My mom has always been cool, and I think she was even cooler before the years of being with dad rubbed off on her. Owell guys, I wouldn’t like you nearly as much if you were bungee-jumping nudists or vegan hippies? so be glad for your nerdiness because it’s what I’ve come to love.

Dave out.

Posted on

finance my backyard with CDs

National still-bustin' day.
Short entry today, I spent last night working on a new project. Without writing much about it, you can read it all at the project’s very own webpage here. If things go well, and I can keep up any kind of pace – I might be able to finance my backyard with CDs. Who knows.

We’re going down to Chowchilla this weekend for Easter. To hang out with Anthony’s family and do an Italian Easter dinner. His folks own and operate a farm down there, and there should be plenty of fun stuff to do. My list includes shooting some guns, driving a tractor, and doing some four-wheeling. Should be a redneck good time. I’m just happy to be doing something for the holiday. Maybe we can visit where all the kids got buried.

It also looks like we may be doing some pre-summer hiking and camping the weekend after this one. My folks are going to Yosemite for their wedding anniversary, and asked Sharaun and I to come down and see the one day while they’re there. I asked the guys if they’d be interested in some freezing cold camping and maybe a short day hike or something. I was surprised when everyone was game, so it seems like we’ll be going down early Saturday and staying over through Sunday. We should have a little time to spend with the parents and then maybe do a hike to the top of vernal or something. Should be fun. I’m really looking forward to some camping, even if it will be 30 degrees out.

That’s really it guys, I burned myself out working on the MP3 page and now I’m spent. Dave out.

Posted on

april fools, fools

It's a joke on your face!
For the first month in the history of pharaohweb.com, I have a new top page. Up until now, my lame old Question Mark & the Mysterians page has been #1 in the server stats. As of March though, my Pac Man pages took the long-held crown. Winning by just under 1000 hits, Pac Man chomped up the competition. I wondered why I was getting so many e-mails about it, seems its made its move. Wonder how long it can stay on top? Jeez, who cares right? Sorry guys? I get proud of nerdy things like web stats? it’s just in my blood. I blame my dad for buying me that electronics kit from Radio Shack back in the 5th grade. When you’re 11 and spending weekends inside learning about current through coiled wire from a talking cartoon capacitor? you’re pretty much destined for geekdom.

In the spirit of April Fool’s Day, Kristi and I spent some time crafting up a joke to play on Sharaun and her man Erik.

The background: Kristi’s job, and mine, find us frequently away from home on business travel. Lately, it seems like we’re both away on business around the same time – sometimes day for day. Last time I came home from Washington, she was also getting in within the hour – so we were both picked up together from the airport. This unplanned travel coordination has led Sharaun and Erik to give Kristi and I a hard time about really not being away on business, but having a secret affair. So we have this running joke between the four of us about Kristi and I going away for “business” to continue our affair.

The setup: Accidentally “out” the affair to Sharaun and Erik. We concocted a joke where we would use photos taken on our respective business trips, and manipulate them to seemingly show us together on the trips. For added reality, we setup a meeting at Kristi’s apartment to take some pictures of us together which I would then Photoshop into the shots from our actually business trips. So, Tuesday night Anthony I and dropped by Kristi’s place with camera in hand. Kristi and I had each combed through our respective trip photos and chosen the best candidates to be Photoshopped into. In going through my pictures, I found a (really crappy looking) picture that I took in my hotel room one morning on my last trip to Taipei. Noticing that there was an unmade bed in the image, I got the idea of adding a still-sleeping Kristi to it. We took some standard “tourists in love” shots, and one of Kristi in bed (fully clothed y’allz… no need to get that authentic) for the hotel shot.

The delivery: I went home and worked some magic with the pictures. And yes, I used the totally awesome (and completely free) GIMP for Windows to do all the Photoshopping. Yeah, I still call it “Photoshopping,” it’s a verb to me now. Anyway I took the doctored photos and added them to a very simple webpage. Then Kristi and I each pretended to “accidentally” send an e-mail to our significant other – when it was really meant for each other. Kristi’s mail to Erik went like this. She immediately followed it up with this. Yeah, I know – that last image (dubbed “the bed one” by Kristi and I) turned out awesome. If you want to see the magic happen, check here.

The payoff: I’m happy (and still married) to say that both Erik and Sharaun got a kick out of our little joke. Although I am a little nervous about paybacks next year.

Dave out.