Category: Random Nonsense

Sometimes I just feel compelled to share nonsense, random thoughts, and sometimes just stuff I want to save

Worse than his usual rubbish

This last season of Doctor Who has been really great.  You have probably gleaned from this blog that I’m a big fan of the show.1

I just re-watched one of my favorite episodes from this season (there were many great episodes this season) – the one with Vincent Van Gogh.

A great bittersweet episode for a melancholy day.  :)

  1. Bonus points if you can name the episode from which I borrowed the title of this post [↩]

I’d rather be blogging

I’m stuck at work.

I read a Penny Arcade post this morning that made me smile.

Humans are always asking us if we ever get tired of doing “Penny Arcade,” which is a reasonable question, but from here inside the mechanism it doesn’t all hook up conceptually. It would be like asking if we get tired of eating “food.” The one thing you may rely upon when it comes to our work is that it will be

1. self-indulgent,

though it may also be gruesome or oblivious, or gruesome and oblivious, depending on the day. “Penny Arcade” doesn’t have a firm definition, it’s a container object that represents our generalized creative output. We make whatever we want to make, which (luckily for us) generally means .jpegs about videogames, but it can also be morality plays about imps and businesscats, samurai with paper tubes, technoir, or any other Goddamned thing. I don’t entirely know how it works, and I don’t entirely know why you stay, but this arrangement appears to work for both of us. And, as I have suggested on many other occasions, you can’t beat the price.

You have to love that.  Every day these guys get up at the crack of noon (or whatever time they’ve chosen to brave the new day), do what they love all day long, and then begin anew.  I mean, can you imagine?  They do what they want, what they would do anyhow, and people love it!1

Now, I consider myself a lucky guy, don’t get me wrong.  I have a great family, good friends, everyone is healthy, good job working with people I like, I can pay my bills, and I have some free time to devote to doing whatever random things occur to me.  I’m probably the happiest and luckiest guy you’ve ever met.2   :)

However, I think my existence is more like Cicero from Gladiator than like Tycho and Gave from Penny Arcade.3

Sorry for the wistful/melancholy post.

Long day (and going to be a lOnNnNnNg night) at work.  :)

  1. It must be like being Tom Green. [↩]
  2. And most modest. [↩]

  3. Maximus: You don’t find it hard to do your duty?

    Cicero: Sometimes I do what I want to do. The rest of the time, I do what I have to.

    [↩]

Halloween costume

My WordPress/gravatar avatar is basically a small picture of David Tennant as Doctor Who.  I started using that picture because I’m a big fan of Doctor Who and have been for a long time. 1  In actually, no one with any visual degree of acuity would ever confuse me with David Tennant. 2 That’s why I thought Bre’s drawing of MakerBlock as a posterized black-and-red rendering of David Tennant was particularly hilarious.  When my wife saw that she couldn’t stop laughing – that picture is just so much cooler than I really am.

That said, I think it would be really cool to dress up as MakerBlock for Halloween.  The idea really only occurred to me today, otherwise I would give it an actual shot.  I don’t think I have time between now and Sunday to source a red and black suit with matching black and red shirt and tie.

  1. I liked Doctor Who before it was cool, man.  Oh, wait, it’s still not cool?  Crap. [↩]
  2. Our only similarity is that he wears glasses sometimes and neither one of us can properly coordinate shoes with suits.  I’m sure his manner of dress is more of a fashion statement.  My inability is better described as a crippling form of fashion Tourette’s syndrome. [↩]

Would you be interested in some free MakerBot prints?

I have this pile of printed PLA pawns I’m not going to be using any time soon.  They’re of varying quality and interesting-ness.  If you’ve always wanted a MakerBot printed part but thought they were just too unattainable, now’s your chance!

I’m going to be at the East Bay Mini-MakerFaire this Sunday just walking around with my family.  If you’re going to be there too, drop me a line or leave a comment and I’ll bring a spare piece for you.  I’ll have at least nine pieces to give away.  (More if I try a few new settings.)  If you’re the only one to respond, you get all nine.  :)

MakerBlock, he’s just this guy, you know?

So, I am just a guy.  Prior to assembling my Cupcake 3D printer I had never fiddled much with electronics, let alone attempted something as audacious as building a robot.  I don’t have a tech degree, I don’t work in a tech field, basically I’m a glorified cubicle plant.  With what little spare time I get, I spend it fiddling with my robot making awesome things and writing about the awesome things people do with their robots.

But, it occurred to me today…  By virtue of building one robot from a kit and writing about robots…  and given my total and complete lack of knowledge and training1 is it fair to call myself a roboticist?

  1. As well as my ample surplus of ignorance and chutzpah [↩]

WordPress developer job posting

A friend of mine is a small business owner in the Sacramento area.  He has seen the light and is finally developing his stuff in WordPress.  (Sorry Drupal guys, he gave that a whirl)  However, he needs a good WordPress developer to help him out.  I’m not positive, but I’m pretty sure he’d be okay with telecommuting.  He’s got several online publications and website based businesses, so he’ll definitely keep you busy.  If you’re interested, shoot me an e-mail through the contact form and I’ll forward your e-mail to him.

I will never ever use MS Office again, unless forced to at gunpoint

MS just released this video bashing open source tech. There are some really amusing points about it. The testimonials describe how wonderful MS Office 2007 is – but MS wants you to buy the 2010 version. Guys, let’s not get ahead of ourselves. This is a word processor – for most people they just need a version of Notepad with grammar and spellcheck.1 This isn’t rocket science. I can’t imagine a business model that requires you to sell your software to your customers every 2-3 years – when the original package TEN YEARS AGO was good enough. Let alone a business model founded on a product that peaked ten years ago with XP. Seriously, the best thing about WinXP was that I never really noticed it. If I notice my OS, it’s because something is horribly horribly wrong.

The testimonials also include people who say their IT support costs soared with questions from users – and that people were used to their old MS interface. Increased support costs? Yeah, that can happen. People resistant to IT changes? Yeah, that happens too. But, the software is free, remember? Each and every license is several hundred dollars. And it needs to be effectively renewed every few years. How’s this for a new MS slogan: “Drink the kool-aid”

Several years ago I bought a pair of brand new Dell laptops with XP. Just before the warranty expired they started to go nutty, shipped them to Dell, Dell lost them, and Dell eventually replaced them – with new models that had Vista. My copies of MS Office 2000 I had bought with my original Dells refused to work with Vista. There was some “bug” that caused any MS Office component to take 10 minutes to load, operate super slowly, and crash. The fix? Oh, just buy 2003. No thank you.

I have used OpenOffice for the last several years and convinced many friends to do the same. I just cannot see spending several hundred dollars for a product the company looks at with an eye towards planned obsolescence.

No, MS, I’m not coming back. And, as soon as I can get Ubuntu to work on my computers and network, you can have my copies of XP as well.

OSS/OSH FTW!

  1. Some more than others. [↩]