RLW::THz Roger L. Waggener::TeraHertz
High Gain Antenna Array
I consider it a blessing to have such a great source of massively diverse music as KDHX the public radio station here in St. Louis.
I consider it a torment that reception of KDHX in my cube is so problematic.
It's never been great, but with the boombox I used to have in here I could get a decent signal after about five or ten minutes fooling around with it. When that venerable old warhorse which someone had dug out of a dumpster, tinkered with till it worked, and given to me about nine years ago finally bit the dust I replaced it with a smaller but newer boombox which had been my wife's until I left it under the glass of the back hatch of our old Toyota Celica in a St. Louis summer several years back.
After that exposure to extreme conditions the top cover that flips down over the top-loading CD player part of the radio melted enough to distort under its own structural stresses and henceforth unable to close, the thing never played CDs again. After much 'discussion' Ruth told me to go ahead and take the thing to work.
The only problem was that it took a lot more work to get it to pick up KDHX. The reception was about the same as the old box, but due to an idiosyncrasy of the tuner of this particular system it was a matter of some frustration and fiddling to make the reception happen at all. Frequently the amount of fiddling rose to the point where I gave up in disgust.
It was after one of these very admissions of defeat last week that I hit upon the idea to haul the receiver I'd bought last summer to use out on the back porch in to work in hopes that its digital tuner would make it possible to get KDHX without problems.
Unfortunately, this plan was not an instant soultion.
Yes, tuning was much easier with a digital display to tell me that the frequency was set precisely to 88.1 MHz, but getting enough eletromagnetic radiation resonant at that frequency directed to the input circuits of the radio was still problematic at best.
The problem had shifted, though. In the past the problem was tuning. Now the problem was that, being at work, I find myself not free to stand stock still holding the end of the short, thin antenna wire coming out the back of the radio pinched between my fingers at the spot where Nijal our cat had gnawed a bit of insulation off so that my skin and natural body impedance and capacitance could be added to the input circuit.
Because when I was holding the wire reception was perfectly crystal clear but when I wasn't holding it- reception was almost nonexistent.
I knew that there was a square loop FM antenna in the box with the radio when I bought it, but subsequent searches of all likely spots at home did not turn up this antenna.
I was growing a little frustrated until I hit upon the idea of possibly adding a bit of wire onto the end of the antenna. Of course, it would have to be of some length to be of use but it might work.
I was about to make a scout around the back half of the building where the construction is drawing slowly to a close, but where there is still drywall dust on the new carpet and enough rough edges that I felt I ought to be able to find something of use.
About to, I say, until I thought to simply look under my desk where I found the treasure that would end my tribulation- an eight foot long piece of raggedy old Category five computer network cable which had been replaced at some point and which was currently unused.
It had RJ-45 connectors on each end but I pulled out my trusty pocket knife and quickly removed the connector off one of the ends (using a pair of big silver scissors since my pocket knife was too dull) and stripped one of the conductors in the wire. I twisted it around the bare spot on the antanna wire and presto!
No, the reception wasn't perfect, but it was much better without me touching the wire.
With a bit of configuration, though, the signal quality was much improved. As I ran the Cat-5 across the top of my shelves and down a cube wall reception improved and now after a bit more fiddling and getting all the loops out and making sure the wire running from the headphone jack of the receiver to the transmitter for my wireless headphones is laying just so- it sounds pretty good.
Monday on a Thursday
For a few days now I've been unable to locate my favorite pen. This particular pen doesn't have any sentimental value, but it is my favorite kind. I like the feel of this type of pen in my hand and I really like the way they write.
These pens come in packages of two and the going rate around here for such a package is $3.19 which is steep enough that I can't really afford to buy them by the dozen like cheap Bics but not high enough to prevent me from getting a couple new ones when I'm out.
"Well, if they come in 2-packs", you say, "just use the other one you got at the same time you got the one you lost. Gimme a break, man, can't you solve a simple problem like that without help?"
The only problem with that plan is that I lost the other pen in the original set of two before I even got a chance to write with it once.
I have another pen which I like pretty well, but it seems to be showing its age. The ink flow is not steady and I occasionally have to retrace what I've written to make it legible, vastly reducing the enjoyability of using it so I really wanted to find my best pen.
I'd asked Ruth two or three times if she'd seen it and requested she keep an eye out for it, but since Monday no one has seen the wayward intrument.
Today I had a special treat. Normally I ride to work with my mother. Her place of employ is exactly on the way to mine, so when we get to her office I take the car on to mine and then at the end of the day I pick her up and she drops my off at my house on her way home. She was off work today to take care of some business so I needed a ride.
Usually under such situations, Ruth drives me to work after we drop Isaiah at school and then she comes back over to pick me up. Since my office is about 45 minutes/20 miles from home, this is not something we want to do (drive back and forth twice in a single day) if we don't have too.
But, since Ruth was going to be doing some things with her mother and aunt today, she suggested I drop Isaiah off at school and then just drive our van to work to save a second trip. I enjoy taking Isaiah to school so this was fine with me. Except, of course, that the van needed gas. OK, that wasn't too big a deal. Ruth gave me a $20 bill so I put gas in the van.
By the time I'd driven half way to work and gassed up, it was close enough to 9 am that I knew I wouldn't make it to the office by then anyway so a mile or so past the gas station I decided I'd stop at Shop'n Save(specifically store #9) and get a new pen(s).
This plan was implemented without a hitch, though as I was paying I thought to myself "I'll probably find the old pen now that I've spent $3.19 to replace it". After buying the 2-pack of new pens there was some good music on my favorite local public radio station as I drove to work.
As I was parking, the announcer mentioned that Frank Zappa and The Art of Noise were coming up after a public service announcement so I got all my gear together and lugged it inside to get set to listen.
Getting set to listen is a little more complicated for me than just turning on the radio. My ears aren't so great so if I were to have a radio playing into the air as some do quietly here in cubicle land, I'd have to have it loud enough to bug other people to be able to enjoy it. I used to use regular headphones, but since my radio is on a shelf above my 21" monitor the cord on most headphones was a bit short unless I sat just so.
In order to allow myself full-spectrum audio enjoyment at work, I bought myself a set of wireless headphones x-mas before last and they are pretty cool. I can keep jamming all the way to the lunch room and back so if there's something good on the radio I don't have to miss a single beat when I go to put my lunch in the microwave or even when I answer the call of nature. The only complication is that I have to connect the transmitter to my radio and thread the cord from the power adapter up to the transmitter through the jungle of cables and wires behind my desk.
It had been a great morning so far. I'd enjoyed spending a few extra minutes at home and dropping Isaiah off at school. I'd gotten some new pens and listened to some good music. The weather was beautiful- slightly chilly but sunny and clear and when I got inside I'd hook up my headphones and listen to some more good music as I went to work.
Here's where it gets Monday-ish.
As I pulled the headphones out of my bag I found the pen I'd just spent $3+ to replace. Then I discovered that laying in the bottom of my junk bag, the switch on the side of the headphones had been set to the "on" position and the two AA batteries required for its operation were dead.
But I guess if those are the biggest problems I have today, I'll do OK.
Under Construction
For approaching 8 years now the environment of my workplace has been relatively stable. The actual walls of the place only changed once about 3 or 4 years ago when new cubicles and some new offices were installed, but that only involved the movement of a few walls by less than ten feet or so.
These days its a totally different story.
The back half of the building is in a state of total chaotic flux.
There are workmen all over measuring, cutting, sawing, hammering, and all other kinds of ings as the place is being totally reconstructed.
Like I said for years now I have been able to follow the same path as I get up to wander around a bit to shake my head clear of the buzzing static of 'monitor eye' or to stretch my legs every now and then.
Down the hall, through the lunchroom, left then through the door to the little backwater nook where the nobody really spends much time (which is one of my favorite places), then left again past a small abandoned lab and through a large mostly empty but still used lab, out to what used to be manufacturing which is training areas and empty space now, around to the another door leading back to the main cubicle area and around the perimeter of the rat's maze back to my cube.
A couple, maybe three times a day that would be my route.
Now I have to concentrate to think what it even looked like.
Every day some new room exists or an old passage is now blocked off. The whole place has changed in a manner of days and it continues to do so.
It won't for much longer, though. Most of the walls are up. There are still some metal studs awaiting garments of drywall, but not many.
It's rather disconcerting to turn to go down a hall just like you did yesterday and have done for years to discover- the hall is gone.
A Report from in the Field
Well, here I am writing a THz from 'Sucker Demographic Night' at the St. Louis Science Center- better known as 'Christian Family Night' at the St. Lousi Science Center.
Yeah, so the deal is tickets are $8 at any of the so-called christian bookstores of a certain kind all of which are 30 miles or more from our house, or $10 at the door- but everything including parking, the Omnimax, and the Planetarium are free. So it's a good deal, right?
Eh, not really.
The 'vendors' are handing you propaganda about religious issues like real estate and life insurance. Then once you've stood in line to buy the tickets at the door since there was no where any where near within reasonable driving distance to buy them in advance, you can go do whatever you want.
Whatever, that is except anything that normally costs money.
For those you have to wait in the interminable line to get into the 'exhibit hall' where you get the little green tickets that gain you admission to stuff like the Planetarium which is all I really cared about seeing.
Why do you have to look at the exhibits to get the tickets?
You've probably already guessed. The exhibits are all set up by vendors.
So, yeah- I'm having a blast and thrilled to have dropped $30 to have the privilege of having flyers for crap I have no interest in foisted on me.
I hope the Planetarium is cool. Speaking of which- we need to go get in line since the tickets they give out are only good for certain showings. We have 7:30 so I need to go.
My Friends are Back!
About a week after the beginning of the year we experience a major "network incident" of an unclear origin here at work. This incident, in the interest of security, required our network connection to run through the New York corporate proxy- complete with aggressive filter.
Now this filter, I was to discover with sizable disappointment, not only precluded the ability for anyone in this building to surf to all the general kind of stuff those filters block, but also entire domains like blogspot.com and geocities. I don't use those services so this didn't prevent me from maintaining my web empire, but many of the sites on my list of daily checks are. More than half are on blogger these days which is served from the blogspot.com domain.
It seemed like I was out of the loop in a couple of interest-based blog groups. Yeah, I could surf them at home, but it seems like everybody on the planet these days but my has broadband and a lot of these guys have pages that weigh a ton at 56k dialup so the connection was made even more tenuous.
Last Friday, though, we reestablished our own network connection. Evidently, there is still a filter in place (people have told me they still hit blocks sometimes) but I haven't hit a one and now all the links in my list are good!
It's like being out of town and returning to catch up on all the news with friends.
Monday the Hard Way
Have you ever worked with someone, specifically worked at showing them how to do something, in which they seemed to do every little thing in a manner that was twice as hard as it needed to be?
For instance, say you are teaching someone how to do a long, complicated process which involved looking at multiple files in multiple directories and comparing those files and modifying them based on each other.
Further, say that the computer you are using runs windows, but also has an X server which provides you the ability to create any number of command-line interface (CLI) windows. (CLI means you have to type the commands and filenames as opposed to an icon-based graphical user interface like windo$e uses).
For some not used to such a thing this concept could be quite disconcerting since each window is based in a 'present working directory' and to look at files in another directory you either have to tell the window to go to that directory, or tell it where to find the files you want information about.
Confused yet? I know Doug isn't. Neither is Neil, but it is easy to see how someone not experienced in such things could be.
Anyway, most folks who use such systems get up to speed fairly quickly and get used to having many such CLI windows in several different directories and even on different computers all on their screen at once. They get into the habit of knowing which one is where and copy-n'-pasting stuff from one window to the other and can really get some stuff done. Ones who are sharp can even make things happen faster by typing commands than their graphical user interface friends can by dragging around and double-clicking icons.
So, when you are teaching someone this intricate, drawn-out procedure and this person says "Arghh- man I hate windows! With Unix this would be so much easier and so much faster." If you are one of those CLI type people mentioned above you tend to agree with them.
Until it becomes apparent that they really can't do it faster and easier with Unix because they are not inherently a CLI type of person and you just wish they would shut up about it because they are driving you nuts!
So I guess the bottom line to this rant is, if you feel you have to type "pwd" every stinkin' time you type "cd .." you should stop talking about how irritating windows is (even though it may be) because its far more irritating to have to watch you using Unix like a 3rd grader than it is to have to drag icons in windows.
And for those of you who don't know a 'pwd' from an 'any key', I suppose a non-computer analogy of a similar level and kind of irritation would be watching someone filing folders (or alphabetizing a collection of books or CDs, etc.) who would pull out one file at a time and then scan from the top of the category list to the bottom until they found just the right place for this folder- over and over and over again, never once grabbing a handful and getting that bunch in proper sequence before filing them, or not even realizing that if the folder you have belongs in the Qs you don't have to start searching for its location in the As.
So I guess the real bottom line of this rant is... take deep breath... let it go. Relax. The day is passing (slowly, but passing) and you will soon get to go home. And soon the training will be over and you can not only rock the keyboard at warp 9 all day on your own, but you will no longer find yourself saying things like "Ok, now we want the xyz.emr file in the airports directory so- uh, why don't you just-
Friday
It's Friday and I'm glad of it, trite though it may be to say such a thing.
My primary task at work this week has been training as in training someone else how to do big parts of what I do.
Generally, I rather enjoy teaching people. I enjoy learning myself and like to share my knowledge with others. It is gratifying to convey skills to others and to see the light of comprehension dawn upon their faces.
What is a drag, though, is being away from my desk all week.
I like teaching people, but what I like even more (specifically at work) is coming in, sitting down at my desk, and being transported to RogerSpace where I need only connect with the world around me occasionally and then only if I so choose.
For a day or two the training thing is no big deal. Especially since there are numerous points where I can say "Ok, you run with that and I'll come back and check on you in a few minutes." and visit my cube for a while to check email and perhaps generate a quick THz. However, this session is scheduled to last eight or nine (hopefully eight) days.
I'm halfway through, looking forward to getting back to my regular routine and just a little extra glad that it's Friday.
Some Days...
Most of the time my job is like a job. I figure it's not that thrilling, but it's better sitting inside clattering on the keyboard all day than digging ditches.
But some days, I'm like Dude- pass me the shovel!
Y'know?
Midnight at the Wax Museum
Since the scifi channel started showing episodes of the Twilight Zone at midnight on week nights a while back, I have been watching it when I can and occasionally taping a particularly good episode here and there when I didn't feel like staying up.
Last night I happened to be up at 11:45 and not sleepy. Furthermore, when I checked the program guide on the dish I saw that the episode, The New Exhibit, that would broadcast in mere moments was about a wax museum and more specifically wax figures of historical mass murderers.
I don't know exactly what it is about wax museums, but they really creep me out. There are plenty of scary-type movies about them, though, so I suppose I'm not the only one. Ruth was finishing folding some laundry as the show began and watched the first few minutes with me, though she went to bed when the first commercial came on.
"I have every intention" I told her "of never going to a wax museum in my life. Those places give me the willies."
Of course never having actually been to one, these impressions are based totally on my experience of watching movies and TV shows about wax museums and this admittedly has probably skewed the sampling population since I don't think there has ever been a movie or show made about a wax museum that didn't portray these places as scary for some intangible reason. On the other hand, if there isn't something about them that many other people find at the very least uncanny in some way, why is it that the only depictions we find are creepy?
I have found that several of the hour-long season 4 episodes just don't have the tight pacing and suspense that made the Twilight Zone so powerful. It seems that the constraint of a mere half an hour forces the stories to be refined down to the purest essence of the idea being presented. The masterful impact of many of the best TZ shows is due to the fact that there is zero fluff and no mistakes- they are as Einstein said things should be: "as simple as possible, but not simpler". A few of the hour-long stories, freed from these constraints feel diluted and weakened from the vast expanse of time that must be filled. Some, though, have more story to tell than would fit in half an hour and therefore instead of weak dilution, we are treated to a double-dose of the good stuff.
"The New Exhibit" is a member of the last category. Pre-infused with a cachet of that paradoxical fascination that makes subjects that terrify us the most appealing and fully filled with story enough to consume a whole hour, this episode is excellent.
The story opens with Martin, the guy who takes care of the wax figures in the museum owned by Mr. Ferguson, leading a tour (which he does not realize will be the last ever in the museum) through the hall of murderers. Martin speaks of the simulacra of the five human monsters on display as if they were their prototypes themselves and lovingly describes them as poor tormented souls driven to their ghastly deeds by inner demons. His love for the figures is obvious.
When he is told by Mr. Ferguson mere moments later that the museum is to be closed and the building torn down to build a supermarket, Martin is lost. Until, that is, he hits upon an idea. He will have an air-conditioner installed and he'll get a heater for the winter and he'll keep the figures he loves so much in his own basement!
Unfortunately, Martin's wife is not as fond of the figures as he is. This I can understand. The empathy Martin has for the figures is palpable and I can appreciate it, but every time (which becomes more and more often as the show progresses) the scene is set in the basement with those five dark shapes looming in the shadows I think to myself something along the lines of "Dude, how can you stand that? I'd go insane". As the story develops, we find such sentiments to be a foreshadowing.
I don't want to give anything away, because this is a tremendous episode with at least two incidents (maybe more for a watcher of a viewing mindset with less jaded and steely resolve in the face of such things) of the notorious Twilight Zone ZAP- which is that tingling rush of emotion that runs through someone at the most climactic moments of the good episodes.
No, I don't want to give anything away, but I will say that near the end of the show when Mr. Ferguson comes to visit Martin and asks about Martin's wife, Emma, Martin is compelled tell his good friend and ex-employer that the figures "haven't been behaving themselves..."
When the show was over I turned off the TV and began turning out the lights in the living room. I spent about ten extra steps to turn on the dining room light before turning off the last light in the living room instead of walking those steps in the dark as I usually do. And though I did pour my bedside glass of water in the darkened kitchen, lit dimly by the spilled glow from the dining room, when I was ready to head upstairs my fingers hesitated on the switch of the one burning light in the house. I shut it off and as darkness enveloped me, relished in suppressing the shot of desire to hurry up the steps.
ennui
Well, my plan to revitalize THz by knocking out numerous tiny crystals of shining content only seems to be possible when things, like, happen in my life.
I mean, when it feels like most days are highly reminiscent of the old yet timeless TV commercial "Time to make the doughnuts" you can see how coming up with something upbeat, interesting, and amusing could be a challenge.
So I guess I'll just have to try harder, eh?
Hey, hey- My my
THz will never die!
Though it may lie dormant for long periods of time just like every other department of my web broadcasting empire.
However, here it is- back again!
I'm going to try to make this what I envisioned it to be- which is a whole lot of short stuff. Y'know little goofy stuff written on the spur of the moment to share my own personal goofy perspective on the world in small yet numerous nuggets of amusing delight.
Please note that the comment system has changed. Now, instead of commenting directly on each post via a mechanism prone to a vile pague of the latest form of spam, there will be a link to the new RLW::RRF- Regular Reader Forum newly updated with a different application that looks nicer, is smaller, and believe it or not (and care or not) NO tables. Yes, it's pure, clean even somewhat semantic XHTML (strict even w00t!).
By the way, pleas also note that you may feel free as a bird now to stop by the RRF and blab away. Go ahead, register now and you can start your own topics and discussions there. Please...
The Battle for Conscio u
It is a cliché in a number of genre 0f movies to see someone, whether it be the hero or the villain, reaching, grasping, striving to press a button, grab a gun, or pull a lever or something like that.
"Must... press... button. Must arghh! Must press..."
You know what I mean.
it's kind of the same here sometimes.
Midafternoon, it's warm and dull in my cube. Having sat on my backside all day, my metabolism is plummeting towards that of a hibernating grizzly bear in January. My eyes grow heavy and my hands take on the sugary-weak feeling you sometimes get when you wake up in the morning and don't have enough strength in your fingers to grip the alarm clock to lift it and pitch it across the room so you lay there listening to it's wailing repraoch cause it's easier to just ingore it than do anything else.
I sit here in front of my monitor like a dozing zombie, head lolling to one side, quite possibly a thin trace of slobber drooling out of the side of my mouth, hand at the edge of the keyboard-
"Must... type... must push... buttons... Have to....ZZZZZZZZZ"
Man, who am I kidding?
Sometimes my days START like that.
To Skin a Cat
No, not how. I know how. There is more than one way, after all.
The question is why skin a cat.
I can give you one that has recently been made known to me.
Last night Ruth laid out the foundational work for the lunch I brought today. She put chips, a plate, and a bag of sesame seed (the only kind I can see paying money for) hamburger buns in my lunch bag and she put the two leftover hamburger patties in a container in the refrigerator and put two slices of cheese right by them. (Yes I do appreciate her, and yes I did thank her for doing this.)
Now my lunch bag is a cubic-shaped thing about eighteen inches by twelve inches by ten inches which, I suppose is not technically cubic-shaped but close enough and the term 'cubic-shaped' is much less egg-heady than the more precise term parallelepiped and we all know cutting down on the egghead factor won't hurt me any. The outer surface of this container is a backpack-ish kind of dark blue nylon and the sides are not hard, but stiff enough to make the bag hold it's shape under some weight.
Some weight, that is, not say, ten pounds or so.
For some stupid reason our dumb, lousy cat decided to sleep on top of my lunch bag last night and she smashed the entire bag of hamburger buns that was in it! Fortunately, very fortunately they weren't totally crushed and the chips were undamaged. She's also lucky she's fast because she was able to evade my grasp as she jumped off the dining room table when I first came downstairs this morning.
So now you know why I would have skinned a cat today.
As I continued to pursue her, though, struggling to suppress the carnage boiling within me, my ride arrived and her demise was postponed for another day.
Business as Usual
Beginning the Friday before last through yesterday I tought a class at work.
I had been teaching two guys who work for a different division of the same parent company how to do a lot of what I do. Along with many proprietary tools and techniques, I had been giving them some training on a 3-d modeling program called Creator.
This experience was not exactly painful, but neither was it something I plan on doing again if given a choice. I suppose part of what made it a chore was the apparent motivation deficit of my students.
Ah, well- that's no skin off my teeth. I won't be the one trying to figure out how to use complex and confusing software tools over the phone.
Uh, but wait... I'll be the one trying to explain complex and confusing software tools over the phone.
Well, anyway the class was over yesterday and now it's back to business as usual which is like a weight off my shoulders.
On my Own
The sky is gray today and the air is cool.
I'd intended to lay down with a good book this afternoon, but I got sidetracked onto the internet and am now in the process of watching the gold medal men's volleyball tournament on TV, surfing web design/tech blogs, and installing MovableType plugins in anticipation of a whole-site architecture reconfiguration.
At the moment I'm home alone since Ruth and the boys went to her folks' house for a while. As she was strapping Gideon into his carseat in the living room she said, "I assume you're not going."
"I, uh, would like to stay home," I replied. This was accepted without trouble and I picked up Gideon's seat to carry it out to the van for Ruth. As we we walked out the door Isaiah asked "Are you staying here, Daddo?"
"Yes I am. Is that the answer you wanted?"
"Yup," he admitted with a devilish grin.
A little dusty, but not lost
Well, here it is- RLW::THz back in action.
I figured if I'm going to start writing UHFs again, I might as well try to get back in the habit of writing THzs, too.
So here is one.
The goofy, weird image to the left is gone not because I decided to remove it, but because in the shuffle and confusion of tinkering with the CSS file for this page (I've since forgotten why I started tinkering with it in the first place) some things got modified without sufficient backups and now the image is just not there.
That's OK, though, because with my newly re-found motivation for writing has come another desire to exercise some creativity by developing a new and better look for THz. Perhaps something that even looks like it was conceived and developed instead of just cobbled together... We'll see.
In the meantime, please feel free to get back in the habit of checking here regularly- perhaps even more than once a day. UHF now is for the big one-a-day (but not necessarily every day) stuff and THz will be for the short, pithy couple-of-paragraph slices of life.
P.S. Please also note that I have installed a MovableType plugin called MT Blacklist which not only has removed the festering blight of comment spam that developed on poor old THz while it lay dormant and forgotten, but will help to prevent such blights in the future.
I'm leaving early again
I got here early today, though.
Ruth got some phone numbers and did some initial calling around for me yesterday in the search for new contact lenses. Then I took the data she gathered and the numbers and ended up with an appointment at 4:40 pm this afternoon.
The first place I talked to had free exams, but the woman there was very irritating and opaque. The second place I called was very helpful and informative. I was actually speaking to Mr. X of X Optical which has been around for a lot longer than the first place I called has been and even with the non-free exam will probably end up being cheaper in the long run.
At least I get to leave early
I guess I'm going to be wearing my glasses for a while. I hate ('despise' or 'loathe' might give a more precise indication of intensity, but let 'hate' suffice) wearing glasses, yet it appears I will have no choice for the immediate future.
Just mere moments ago, I left my desk with the intention of purchasing a bag of Chili-Cheese Fritos from the vending machine to go with the can of Coke I already had. Between my desk and the destination mentioned above, however, my desire to make a preliminary stop became evident. As I stood attending to the matter requiring attention, I blinked in response to a sensation of slight irregularity in my left eye.
When I blinked I could tell that my left contact lens had gone out of position. This normally isn't a big deal. In fact, I've perfected (I thought) a method of closing my eye just right so that the lens would return to it's normal location, perhaps requiring a slight manual adjustment, but nothing out of the ordinary.
When I reopened my eye the lens was not back in position. With no trepidations, I simply squeezed the eye shut again hoping to contain the lens till my hands were free to readjust it. "Man, I hope it's still in my eye," I thought to myself "What a place to loose a contact- even if I found it, I'd never put it back in my eye..."
I didn't find it, though.
It's gone- lost, and as I mentioned above, even if I did find it, it would either be on the floor of the men's room or resting in an even less sanitary location which would render it totally contaminated and unusable.
So now I have one contact lens in my head. It's a little disconcerting. If my vision were not correctable with lenses I would qualify as being legally blind. The last time I had it measured it was something like 20/400 which is very, very bad. What this means is that my right eye sees and can read each character I'm typing, but my left eye perceives a fuzzy rectangular thing with some colored square-ish shapes on its surface. In order for my left eye to realize that there is text on the monitor, I have to lean forward until my forehead is about nine inches from the screen and in order to actually read it, I have to lean even closer.
It was only a few days ago that Ruth asked me about getting new contacts.
"When these wear out I'll worry about getting new ones. I don't even know where I'd go. Last time I got new ones it was at the place that had bought my records when the previous place I got'em went out of business and now the new place is out of business too!"
"You could go to [businessname] Optical. I really like them. They've fixed my glasses for free a couple of times when I lost a screw."
"Maybe I will when the time comes," I replied, totally unconscious of the ironic foreshadowing "but for right now I'm not concerned about it."
Well, now I'm concerned about it. I'm also concerned about not only finding the time to spend what'll likely end up being multiple hours getting my vision measured, corrective lenses prescribed, and an appointment made to come back and pick them up. They never seem to have my industrial strength prescription on hand. I'll also have to be concerned about paying for it all which, though not impoverishing, will almost certainly put a hitch in the ol' economic git-a-long for a while.
At least I get to leave work early. There's no way I could see well enough to drive home after dark.
Huzzah!
I suppose in the interest of actually telling news instead of keeping it under my hat for a few weeks before it's made known, barely noticeable, in a massive omnibus edition of RLW::UHF, I should make known the today's delightful event here and now.
The duplex next door to us (the near half, anyway, the other side has never been a problem) has been cleared out!
Yes, a small cadre of Alton's Finest today lead the 'nominal adult', that is, the only person there who appears to be over 18, and her 'idiot-looking' (The cop's words, not mine. We referred to him as 'Frankenteen') son away in a squad car.
Evidently all the other troublemakers that seem to be perpetually there were either off making trouble elsewhere at the time, or they were guided by the sixth sense that seems to keep those who would normally attract the attention of the constabulary from getting caught, to find a different location for a while.
Later in the day, Ruth said, some familiar faces were seen entering and exiting the domicile in question apparently looting the place of anything not nailed down. Of course Ruth let the fuzz know what was up, but she was on her way out the door to the grocery after she hung up the phone so we don't know what transpired later.
We'll not miss the noise, strife, antics, and carelessly strewn trash of that gang next door.
I wish them luck in their new location.
I'm not mean spirited and I hope nobody gets serious jail time (unless they deserve it for things I didn't know about), but I do hope their new location is far removed from mine.
Better than even
I took the day off work yesterday to work on the van.
I had intended to take a half-day, but my rate of progress did not let me do so. I ended up having to take the whole day off.
Normally, my inclination would be to simply take the whole day off regardless, but I'm trying to be very careful with my vacation time lately so that I can take two solid weeks off when we have our second child in about 4 weeks. Sometimes, though, you just have to take the time.
So I took the time and got the van fixed and had a good day at home with the family to boot.
Then today I got an email that informed me that I have twelve hours of floating holiday time that I have to use before the year is over.
Well- Hey!
There's yesterday free of charge, and the half day I was wondering how to get a hold of for the day before Thanksgiving when Isaiah's preschool class is helping to prepare a turkey dinner for all the parents.
I am pleased.
This Friday feels like Thursday
And yesterday, Thursday, felt like a Friday for a number of reasons.
One was that I had a short day and another was what went on during that short day.
I overslept and woke up at 8:30 which meant that after a shower, dressing, bidding good day to my family, and a visit to the bank, I passed by by the front door of my house at just about exactly the time I should have been arriving at work, not beginning my forty-five minute drive. And forty-five minutes it was. I showed up at work at a quarter to ten.
Then about an hour and a half later I left, with the whole gang, for a two hour lunch. Ordinarily that would be a very excellent thing, and don't get me wrong, it was a good thing, but the circumstances which precipitated it were less than desirable.
One of my best pals is going to other employment. Yesterday was his last day. He's filling out paper work and getting 'badged' as they say, at his new place of business today.
Though unfortunate for me, it's very good for him and he'll only be a few miles away so he'll probly be able to join the gang for lunch on Fridays almost as often as he did before.
Since we had our big going-someplace lunch yesterday, I haven't started to get the Friday vibe yet, but as the hands of the clock sweep out the hours, the day grows old and I feel the weekend approaching.
The Singing Scanner
We've got a Umax PowerLook 2100 XL here at work Which I like to use.
It's pretty honkin' big and it's also slow, but it can scan at up to 9600 dpi x 9600 dpi which is very cool. That's not as high as the Howtek drum scanner we used to have around the place, but the poor old Howtek bit the dust a year or two ago after having sat unconnected and unused for at least a year previous.
The Howtek was fun because it had mechanical parts rotating at thousands of RPM, but the Umax is even more fun because it sings to me when I use it.
It doesn't really sing I guess, but it does invariably produce a sequence of audible tones which probably irritate most folks, but which I have chosen to classify as musical. I have no idea just exactly how it produces the sounds, but as the motion of the light source/sensor assembly begins the scanner produces a sequence of rising tones that conclude with a constant hum as the assembly completes the scan. When it parks, the sequence of tones is reversed.
Like I said, it's not exactly the Boston Symphony, but I think it sounds nice.
Option 3
OK, Nail-biters and edge-of-seat sitters- here's the deal on my lunch.
I totally overlooked option 3 in my previous considerations- and it is the one I ended up selecting.
I got the 12' and at the whole thing today.
A Quandary...
Within my wallet today I have not one, but two fully stamped Subway SubClub cards.
For those of you who may not be familiar with such things, a SubClub card (herafter referred to as a SCC) is a substrate upon which stamps, rewarded to the purchaser with the purchase of Subway sandwiches, are to be placed. When the SCC has all it's rectangular spots filled with stamps, it can be used as a sort of coupon which allows one to buy a 21 fl. Oz. drink and receive and 6" sandwich at no charge.
Here's the quandary: I have two full SCCs. Do I use them both today and get TWO 6" sandwiches (or one 12"), eat ½ today and ½ tomorrow, OR do I use only one of the SCCs today for a single 6" sandwich and save the other non-expiring SCC for use another day?
Option 1 is the economical winner since I only have to buy one drink to get all 12" of sandwich, while with option 2 I must buy 2 drinks for 2 sandiwches. However, if I choose option 1, my lunch is cast indelibly for tomorrow since the second 12" will be past its prime and rather a dicey proposition on Wednesday and totally inedible in Thursday.
I know that anyone who may, on the off chance, happen to check this long-abandoned page will be dying of suspense as they tensely await official notification of the important topic of my lunch, so I'll let you all know right after I've eaten it.
An unexpected score
I was walking down the hall on the periphery of our rat's maze of cubes when this guy rounds the corner on a path approaching mine.
As he nears, I notice he has something in his hand- a doughnut. He sees me see the doughnut and says "I lost the battle. I had to pick it up."
"Where, where did you get it?!"
"In the break room- there's one left."
And yes there was one left! A delicious looking cinnamon-ey, apple-ey thing.
As I picked it up, I wondered if it was the property of the coffee club. Sometimes they use the excess of the nickels and dimes they collect from the members each week to buy doughnuts, typically, though, on Friday mornings. I used to think they were for everybody until one day a long time ago a member of the coffee club politely cleared up my misunderstanding.
But, hey, come on- I say whoever bought it, if it's still there at 4:30 pm, it's fair game. Fair and very tasty game.
A rough day for Christopher Glenn
Whenever I hear the voice of longtime (very long) CBS news commentator Christopher Glenn, I'm transported back to the days when Satruday morning TV was for kids.
For a decade, starting in 1972, he hosted In the News. For some reason I'll never forget the computery sound of the audio theme (it wasn't really a song, just a 5 second sound) or the animated spinning globe that opened the short current events news segments that were served between the shining stars of the pinnacle of children's television that was 70s Saturday morning cartoons.
I don't normally listen to a station that plays CBS news, I'm an NPR man, but this morning I bummed a ride from my mother, who works close enough to where I do that she doesn't mind, and she had on the local am talk station upon which Mr. Glenn can be heard every morning with a short current events roundup much like 'In the News' was but for grownups.
Today's broadcast, though, made obvious that noone is perfect- even an inveterate professional like Mr. Glenn. Several times he had to re-read a word or slow down and correct himself. Even with these glitches, though, the news was communicated smoothly and clearly in a manner only a seasoned pro can pull off.
And with the nostalgic connection to my youth I always feel when I hear his voice, I'd probably tune in to listen to him read the phonebook, but if Speed Buggy didn't come on in a few minutes, I'd probably switch back to NPR or put in my Abner Jay tape.
New Neighbors
A new apparently familial unit has moved into the rental duplex next door to us.
A woman, her kids (near as I can figure about 3 or 4 of'em), and her boyfriend.
She seems OK and the boyfriend appears to be alright too but if the teenage boy over there doesn't learn to appreciate my desire to not have to listen to his too-loud vile-language gangsta rap, the whole family may have to hear about how "I don't want to go back to jail and I sure don't want to hurt anybody, but when people disrespect me something, like, clicks in my head and I lose control..."
A country in the clouds
As I was crossing the bridge on my way to work this morning, I looked up and over my left shoulder into the eastern sky.
The ragged shreds of last night's storm lay over the sun and I saw a huge, grey map in the sky. The dark billows looked like the atlas of a mythical continent, land of legends and mystery. The edges of the clouds were the coastline of this silver island of mist floating in an azure sea of sky.
The undulations of water vapor described vast and daunting mountain ranges crossed at peril by explorers of yore and wide desert expanses home to unimagined nomad cultures. Lifetimes, empires, even whole ages floating on the edge of reality played out in the sky in a brief flash of imagination.
As the wind eroded the sky-landscape, millenia passing in minutes, I returned to reality and continued down the road.
HipHop
Listening to a hip hop CD borrowed from Intern Corey earlier today inspired me to exercise my own lyrikal skillz.
I had just finished listening to the CD when it was time for about four of us to leave for the restaurant we'd planned yesterday to go to today. The music I'd been hearing, combined with the lack of hustle in my co-luncher's exit led me to burst into rhyme:
let's go, it's time to depart
and make a start to get to the heart
of the real deal- eating our meal
It's time to munch a lunch wit da crazy bunch
After that I successfully resisted the temptation to exhort everybody to put their hands in the air and wave'em like the just didn't care.
I need a new swipe card
Access to our building is controlled at each but the front main doors by the use of swipe cards.
You place your card in close proximity to a black detector thing, the LED changes from red to green, the thing beeps and you can open the door.
Though I've only ever kept my card in my wallet, I guess it's had a few too many trips through the washer and a little too few dollars in the wallet to protect the card from flexure.
Not only is it dirty and cruddy-looking (from just being in my wallet- where does the crud come from), but it's got more than one crack running through it.
In order to get in the building I have to hold the card against the detector gently bending it slightly this way and that until I hear the beep. And even all that monkey business doesn't work at all the doors.
I went outside a while ago to drop 9 postcards in the blue mailbox at the corner of the two streets that edge our parking lot, and I couldn't get back in the door I came out of.
That's OK. It's a nice day for a walk, but I think I need a new card.
Typical
A while ago a certain notorious program manager stopped at the intersection of Polygon Alley and the main drag (that is, the cubicle row I am in and the main thouroughfare, so to speak) and asked my next door neighbor and I if either of us knew how to "print a g-i-f file".
In typical program manager fashion, he said he'd dragged it into micro$oft Word, but it wouldn't print the document. I told him to open it in a web browser and print it from there.
I was not surprised when even this proved to be beyond his capabilities and he was back in a few minutes.
"Hey, that didn't work. I just emailed it to both you guys. Can one of you see what you can do with it?" Now, neither one of us are working on any projects for this guy, but I checked my email anyway to see just what was special about this "g-i-f" file that wouldmake it so confounding.
The thing was like 7 megabytes!. I opened it and it was some 2300 x 3300 pixels. Furthermore, it appeared to be a 2 color image of some sort of privacy fence plans.
"Uh, Dude, this isn't even for work is it?"
"It's for my subdivision comittee- I need a hardcopy tonight. Can you send it to the big printer in back?"
"This is a raster image. The plotter can only do vectors."
"Speak, english. I don't follow you."
"OK, bottom line- I can't help you. Sorry."
As the guy turned around he nearly bumped into the head of the computing department.
"Hey, Doug- Just the man I'm looking for!"
I didn't hear their discussion as they moved off. I didn't want to, either.
We're gonna be famous
My pals Ed and Corey and I just submitted a picture for 2:01 pm to humanclock.
Keep checking every afternoon at 2:01 till you see us there!
Repentant
I am sorry.
I should have listened to my conscience. I didn't do that and now I must pay the price.
Why, O, why did I get that stupid second bratwurst? Ugh.
A beautfiful day for a barbecue
Actually it's not a beautiful day for a barbecue. It's gray, rainy, and- hold on- yes, it's still chilly. But today is the day of the Manager's Cookout where I work. As I type a gang of mangers is out by the loading bay (which is not used much at all now that our shipping/receiving department is in another building about 100 yds away) cooking hamburgers, hot dogs, and bratwurst over a grill about 4 ft in diameter.
They plan these things once or twice a year. Although I, at least, will definitely be eating inside, who can knock a free lunch?
Moot Point
I was just reading about a new technology I may soon be adding to the vast panoply of my web empire at http://masonbook.com/book/chapter-9.mhtml and the author at one point said "this argument is moot if"
Now the context of this quotation is irrelevant. What caught my attention was the use of the word moot. It's a fairly common word with which many have no trouble at all. Some, though, do not grasp the concept, I know not why, that there is such a word as "moot".
I only mention all this because it always irks me when someone talks about a "mute point".
For the record, folks, all you are doing when you talk about a "mute point" is letting the rest of us know that your vocabulary skill could use a little polishing. Of course, if I pointed out the proper pronunciation of the correct word to such people, they'd probably think I was dumb for making up words.
So the point is moot.
Note: In all honesty, I must admit that when I read the "official" definition of the word moot I was a little surprised. As defined, it lacks the connotation of irrelevance that is normally it's main usage point these days. Therefore, I was greatly relieved to see the Usage Note: at the bottom of the page linked above.
I have been using the word in a manner only semi-fitting to its official definition, but which is accepted by 59% of the Usage Panel of The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language- that is to imply that the discourse described as moot is not only open to debate but that it is "of no significance or relevance."