Living in fear is no good to anyone.

On Friday evening, I put the top down on the jeep because I knew I'd be doing a bunch of driving and the weather would be nice. Movie night went well; some people that don't usually come came, making the crowd about as big as it would usually be excepting that people were away on spring break.

Saturday morning I drove up to Albuquerque to meet popefelix and pick up the bar stools I ordered from Unpainted Furniture. Lunch at Taj Mahal ended up being more complicated than anticipated, but was OK. After lunch I went up to Desert Rat, looked around since I hadn't been in the store before, and bought a tow strap and clevices to replace the ones that were stolen back in January. Next was 328 Chinese to get a bunch of takeout for dinner. Ying and John were both very friendly, chatted with me a bit, and gave me some free crab rangoon and chicken in foil while I waited for the takeout to be prepared. It turns out they've been open since January 26th. When I asked Ying, she said 328 is "just a name; a lucky number." Finally, I went to Unpainted Furniture to get the stools. It had been my understanding that they would be assembled stools I would just need to finish, so I had taken the back seat out of the jeep. They were actually just pieces in boxes that I'll have to put together myself. This is good and bad: it's more work for me, but they will likely look nicer than if they had been pre-assembled. When I got back to Socorro, I bought a hat at Brownbilt's to protect my head from the sun when my jeep's top is open. Finally, we had a big dinner of the take out from 328. The dishes were all as good as before at the old Hong Kong.

Today, Sunday, royal_spice and popefelix came down and we went out to explore in the jeep. We first went out to Garcia Canyon (it's west of Water Canyon) and drove until we ran out of road the jeep would fit on. We then parked and hiked up the canyon and then up the west side for a while. Next was Jordan Canyon (it's west of Garcia), but a short way up the road, there was a locked NFS gate with a "Road Closed" sign. There was a track over some big rocks around the gate that I could have made, but it was decided best by all to just go somewhere else. We instead went back to the Water Canyon road and up the South Baldy road to the top. Up there, we hiked around some looking at the panorama. Once we were tired, we went back down and to Socorro and had dinner at Sofia's. After dinner they left. A good day was had by all.

Photos of 328 Chinese were uploaded to my flickr yesterday. Photos from today's trip will be uploaded tomorrow, probably.

The flight was nice and smooth. Hopefully I'll be home by 0100.

The place amnesiack and I had lunch at today is:
The Wayward Cafe
901 NE 55th St
Seattle, WA 98105

Flight from SEA was good. Just landed. Hopefully the next flight will be good. The last time I did the PHX->ABQ leg, I almost was sick from the turbulence, and I pretty much never get motion sickness.

amnesiack picked me up and we went to an early lunch at a vegan, community run "greasy spoon" type diner. I had a really good nutloaf sandwich and bowl of minestrone. After lunch, we went to his house and sat around for a while. We caught up on lots of stuff. It's really nice to be able to talk to someone you trust that is totally objective and outside of your immediate situations. Thanks.

After hanging around, I took a bus downtown and transferred to a bus to the airport. I'm past security having a nice sitdown dinner at Anthony's. Dungeness Crab Cocktail and Mahi Mahi Tacos FTW.

DB and Reid are putting me up for the night. They have a longer but less wide couch than petfish. Tomorrow I'm going to help Reid replace one of his headlights and then go to lunch with amnesiack.

I went to sleep last night on petfish's couch at about 0200 PST. My body likes waking up at 0800 MST regardless of how tired it is. 5 hours of sleep may be enough for the peak work days of a con, but it's not enough for a vacation. Grrr.

Last night there was a big party in a UW auditorium with 3 big screens playing various games on Xbox 360, Wii and PS2. There was also some good Mario Kart DS action. Pizza and cake was had by all, and everyone seemed to have a good time. I got online from my MacBook and uploaded the photos I took yesterday. The laptop they got for retrocareer is awesome. They also bought her a new WoW account and installed all of the recent patches (and expansion?).

There was some wander-shopping in downtown and chinatown in the afternoon with retrocareer, her friend Ian and omg_teh_funnay.

The morning included a bus trip up from Seatac (the town, not the airport) and some sitting on a peir taking some photos (also uploaded).

I only got ~5 hours of sleep that night too.
omg_teh_funnay put me up at his apartment near the airport after meeting me at said airport and hanging out at Denny's for a while.

Today is ...adventure? during the daylight hours followed by some fish shopping and much homemade sushi with most of the crowd from last night's party. I'll also be making a batch of habanero slarg as part of tonight's dinner.

The flight was very smooth. We landed about 20 minutes early.

It pretty much only happens when I'm flying, and only sometimes, but I think about my death. I don't believe in any afterlife. I believe that when you die, you don't even know it because you no longer exist. The gloomy "In Case of an Emergency Landing" video often prompts it. I wonder if I'm wrong. If there is something else, I'm not ready for it. I'm afraid of the totally unknown.

No body.

I parked with FastPark. They cost half what the airport long-term does, and their shuttle picks you up right at your car.

The new TSA checkpoint at ABQ has impressed me with its efficiency each time I've been through. The screeners are in abundance and people seem to flow through very well. One thing that's also nice is that the divestiture tables are at the correct height such that your bins shove right in without lifting (I believe they used to not match up right, even after the remodel). I'm well enough acquainted with their system, that I haven't had any complications for my past few flights. It takes 4 bins to get all my shit through, but I'm able to take my time unloading and loading my stuff.

In the previous post, I didn't mean to equate Al Gore and Bill Richardson, in case you interpreted it that way. My link was simply the article title. I don't yet think that Richardson has as good a chance as Gore did in 2000, but I like him more than I did Gore in 2000 and considerably more than any of the other potentials I've heard of for 2008.

I'm off to visit some of my PAX Enforcer friends. I plan to make various posts during my travel. If I haven't posted again by Friday afternoon, something has gone wrong (the internet is fuxxored, I have been physically incapacitated in some way, I am being held by the government without charge, etc.).

Even though I will be gone, two_pi_r and lalabob11 are hosing a movie night tomorrow. I don't know what the food or movie will be.

These comparisons seem obvious to me, but they aren't in the press as often as they should be:

Another Vietnam? Defenders of President Bush's Iraq war policy have long shrugged off such comparisons. But as the war heads toward the four-year mark and a newly empowered Democratic Congress takes aim at presidential spending for more troops, the comparisons are becoming more frequent.

Generals are saying the Iraq War is making us less secure. Whee:

Nearly four years in Iraq have hammered US army and marines into a skilled counter-insurgency force but has left it unready for war against a conventionally armed foe, US generals warn.

Is Bill Richardson the new Al Gore?
Richardson's my favorite prospective candidate right now, but there's lots of time for things to change.

Many security specialists (including me, if that's not yet clear) are skeptical of the value of ID-based security generally, and believe that the TSA has not demonstrated (in the public literature at least) that an ID-based system is an effective or efficient form of protection against aviation terrorists. But because it is so easy to circumvent the TSA's mechanism, one does not need to agree with that broad point to see that the current system needs to be replaced. Since the ID system can be reliably bypassed by criminals and terrorists, we pay all of the costs associated with ID-based security and yet get none of the potential benefits, whatever they might be. That should be unacceptable no matter where one stands on the other issues. [bold emphasis mine, italics in original]

Clearly, liability is not all or nothing. There are many parties involved in a typical software attack. The list includes:

• the company that sold the software with the vulnerability in the first place
• the person who wrote the attack tool
• the attacker himself, who used the tool to break into a network
• and finally, the owner of the network, who was entrusted with defending that network.

100% of the liability should not fall on the shoulders of the software vendor, just as 100% should not fall on the attacker or the network owner. But today, 100% of the cost falls directly on the network owner, and that just has to stop.

"If my Democrat colleagues are truly opposed to the mission in Iraq, then as the new majority in Congress they should schedule a serious debate and a vote on cutting off funding for our troops," said Cornyn, R-Texas.

Cutting off funding for the troops in Iraq could be a great idea. The troops would mutiny and come home to see their families, abandoning the Iraqi Civil War to itself. The Shia and Sunni have been fighting for something like 1200 years. They can wait us out as long as needed, so we might as well just get out of their way.

If lawmakers make good on their pledge, the Heritage Foundation figures that 67 million more foreigners will enter the United States in the next 20 years. That surge surely excites multiculturalists and capitalists eager for an endless flow of cheap labor.
But Americans have a different desire.
In opinion poll after opinion poll, U.S. citizens say they want less immigration, not more. They want existing laws enforced, not nullified.

I sympathize with people who aren't making very much and are probably forced to comply with arcane corporate rules and who have to deal with weirdoes coming in with cans labeled "Rocket Fuel." I really do. But... c'mon. How much effort is involved in *not* being part of the common-sense-negating, spirit-crushing, Bush-era fear-slash-stupidity machine? The terrorists win again.

In the interests of dignity, we have taken public executions out of the public square where vendors used to go around selling treats to the slavering crowd. We have invented execution lite, strapping people to gurneys and injecting them with fatal drugs.
But even if we killed criminals by making them watch public-television fund drives until they expired, it would still be undignified. Premeditated killing is always undignified. The crowd outside still drools in its imagination.

This is really sweet (a myspace music thing):
http://www.myspace.com/computerthanks
I've heard other songs of his, but this one is extra good.

greyvorfeed is awesome.
In related news, Pentagon memo predicts 10,000 or more American soldiers could die in Iraq by 2008

My friend retrocareer also goes by the handle "mygiantrobot". In a few weeks, she is going up to WA to visit a bunch of our common friends. A couple of them made and sent her this freakin' awesome poster:
( My Giant Weekend Poster )

Random interesting things:

Parking in two spaces

I had seen the opposite as regards kittens a few years ago, but I'd never seen this before:
Think of the Puppies

http://www.skygod.com/asstd/abc.html

http://www.nsc.org/lrs/statinfo/odds_dying.jpg

10th Annual Festival of the Crayons.
Originally uploaded by jarrodlombardo.

royal_spice came down to Socorro Saturday night and we went to the Festival of the Cranes on Sunday. I didn't really get any good photos of cranes, but I got lots of snow geese. Photos from the Festival of the Cranes

I also uploaded the panoramas from last week's North Baldy Trip.

Friday night, JPL went upt to Casa Imbri and played games and generally had a good time with the various Albuquerque people we know. We spent the night there.

Saturday morning, I went on a bike ride with aisa0, ravendisplayed and royal_spice. After the ride, I spent the rest of the day with royal_spice.

We went mattress browsing (I need a new one). After getting the info from ~6 stores, we went to the new Williams-Sonoma in the Uptown Center. The area was a madhouse of way too many snooty people. We didn't buy anything and got out of there pretty quickly.

We then got some coconut milk tea with lychee jelly before going to a coffeeshop for yarrowkat's poetry reading. I generally liked the poems I heard, but poems (and lyrics) aren't usually my thing. For many of her poems, I didn't really hear the words as much as I heard the sounds and cadence (there was nothing wrong with her speech or the sound system, it was just the weird way my mind was working). My unusual way of experiencing the reading was good, even though I'm sure there was lots of meaning in the poems that I missed.

Finally was dinner with a bunch of Albuquerque people at the Taj Mahal. A total of roughly 15 people came. We ended up having the big downstairs room to ourselves, so we were able to be loud and raucous to a greater degree than if we had been seated in the main dining area upstairs. I believe everyone had a good time and enjoyed the food.

After dinner, we stopped back at Casas Imbri and Spice to pick up items we had left there that we needed to take home. We still ended up forgetting the 2 pillows I brought up to stay the night at Casa Imbri (if you guys could get my pillows to royal_spice some time this week that would be excellent, because I know I'll be seeing her this coming weekend, but I don't know that I'll be seing you that soon). The ride back to Socorro was uneventful.

Unrelated to the rest of this post, this is awesome in a broken sort of way (sfw):
http://community.livejournal.com/webcest/433555.html

There is a movie night tonight. The plan is to make fried green tomatoes and corndogs.

There will be a movie night next week too.

November 10th, there won't be a movie night because there is something at Casa Imbri that evening (I can't recall what it is right now, but JPL wanted to go up for it).

Home and in bed. Yay. First Indian cooking class tonight.

We left Denver at about 2130.
I'm probably (90%) a staff head next year at NDK.
I got a bunch of really qualified people interested in being PAX Enforcers for PAX07.

At the Village Inn ~6 miles away from the convention hotel getting breakfast. Kevin says he signed up for early check-in, so we'll actually be able to put our stuff in the rooms immediately after arrival.

We're in Raton refueling. We're moving steadily toward Denver. Whee!

I took a few big sections out of this one to make it "for public consumption". Comments are open, as is usual.

The questions overlap, so I'm going to have a sort of overlapped answer. I don't fully know what I want from life. As regards work, I hope to keep making enough money such that I don't need to worry about money too much. I'd like to do work more enjoyable/fulfilling than the programming I'm doing now. There are other jobs in the computer field that appeal more, but I'm not really qualified for them yet. What I'm doing now can be used as a stepping stone though. I'd kind of like to eventually get an SJD and become a judge somewhere, but I don't want to go back to school for any graduate degrees until I have a much larger savings base than I currently have and deciding to go to school for another 7-10 years isn't a decision I'm ready to make right now. I'd also like to be able to make convention organization a paying job somehow, but there are location issues with that (it would be much easier if I lived in a major metro area, and NM doesn't have any of those).

The immediate plan is for me to stay at PMC and save money as well I can (I need to budget better, but even with my lax budgeting, I'm saving a sizable portion of every paycheck, 15%-40%) until near Lauren's graduation. The plan then is for me to find a better job, hopefully in the western WA area, and we would move to that job after she graduates. We don't have enough information at this time to really plan more specifically. We'll see where we are in another ~year and have more things roughly figured out.

Of the parts of the country I've visited or lived, I like the Pacific north west the best. I really dislike the climate here in NM. The dryness and altitude work together to make my lungs strain with a near continuous low level amount of pain (I'm able to ignore it most of the time, except for especially dry days, but it's still annoying). I sleep waaay better in a more humid, lower altitude place. Washington appeals to me for the general prettiness in addition to the climate reasons. The Seattle area appeals to me more specifically because I already have a bunch of friends there, through PAX and other things. Depending on where political things go, I might like to leave the country on a long-term basis. I'm not really worldly enough to go anywhere but Canada in the soon, but I think I'd have time to get ready for many places if it came to that.

I have vague plans and goals, but nothing is really very long term. I want to be happy. I want my loved ones to be happy. I don't want to hurt others to do that. I deal with situations as they come and try to make them fit the goals, though I don't just stand by and wait/hope for fortune to come to me without effort.

There is no Movie Night tomorrow as JPL will be at baronj's party.

There may not be a movie night next week as I will be in Denver and lalabob11 and two_pi_r may not want to host one.

This Friday, tomorrow, there will not be a movie night here at JPL because there's the Casa Imbri 3.0 housewarming in Albuquerque.

Next Friday, September 22nd, there will be a movie night at JPL.

Friday, September 29th, there will not be a movie night at JPL because of the Flatwarming Party at Forward Observation Post November-One-Three (baronj has a silly name for his abode, don't you think?) in Albuquerque and then king_luddite's gaming night the following evening.

Movie nights should return to normal weekly scheduling for October.

If you are interested in the three parties listed above (the ones not at my house), you should contact their respective hosts about attending. I do not wish to invite anyone to someone else's party out of place. Everyone who reads this (and hasn't been specifically banned) is welcome to attend JPL Movie Nights.

lalabob11 and I are on the way to Albuquerque for her to do some work for one of her jobs. If anyone wants to meet us somewhere for dinner or other stuff this evening, let me know. She should be done with her work stuff by 5 p. m. at the latest.

Update: She had 2 stores to survey. Her boss said they'd each take about an hour. The first has taken about 3 hours so far (it's about 1630 now). I have no idea for the second. It might be quite late. Though if Albuquerque people do want to meet with us, ping me and I'll get back to you.

Update: We went to Hurricane's between stores. She'll probably be beat when she's done, so we may go straight back to Socorro after the store.

Landed. I don't ever get motion sick, but the turbulence between PHX and ABQ was so bad I felt sick most of the way. Now that we're stopped, I'm feeling fine.

Landed fine. Expect to take off fine.

I didn't know how much traffic there would be and I also couldn't remember how far the airport was, so I allocated 1:30 to get there, fill up the car and drop it off. It actually only took 35 minutes. The rental car company didn't try to dick me on the bad car swap, which was nice (I might not have posted about it, but the first rental car they gave me had a bad alternator and needed to be swapped with a new, working car a few days after I got here). I ended up paying exactly what I expected.

I had figured that I'd grab breakfast at Ivar's stand in the airport. After getting through security, I saw that Anthony's had a sit-down restaurant inside security. I had shrimp-crab scrambled eggs and a prawn bloody mary at Anthony's.

Now I'm just sitting around waiting for my check and then on to sitting around at my gate.

The show last night was really fun. I danced for 2 hours straight, Blank and Jones' whole set. I got a few good photos during the show. After, they were handing out signed cards so I grabbed one on the way out.

Yesterday I ate some good seafood, but little of it was exceptional. The one that was exceptional was the dungeoness crab cocktail at Anthony's in Kirkland. I spent over two hours in Uncle's Games in the Redmond Town Center talking with the manager and playing some games. I ended up buying 5 new games: Niagra, Giza, Tsuro, Alahambra, and Across The Desert. They all look to be varying levels of awesome.

This morning I woke up at 0430 so I could be on the road by 0500 so I could get to the Anacortes Ferry in time to make the 0740 ferry out to the San Juans. The day is up in the air; I have no particular plans other than to try and see pretty things.

Tomorrow evening I'll be going to see The Illusionist and get dinner with some PAX friends and later go to see Blank and Jones (crazy German DJs) in Seattle.

I'll be back in NM Saturday night.

I'm still in WA, so no photos until I get back to NM. I took a good number of them.

The con was a blur of crowds, queues of people, securing equipment and celebrities from the ravages of said crowds, moving pallets and crates full of gaming merch and displays, and most importantly, doing it all with a great group of staffers. Working with a group of dedicated people to create/enable thousands of people to have a great time is wonderful. The pleasure I get from it is totally worth the expense of flying out here and staying in a hotel for days.

The crew party last night was a lot of fun, with lots of "Guitar Hero" and general fun/silliness. The location was a fall-back to a fall-back to a fall-back to our preferred location since many things went wrong during the party planning, but everything worked out pretty well. Jerry also gave me his old sk2 last night (this post was written on it).

Tonight I should get to see Layla and Dan and maybe others. The rest of the week is up in the air.

There was rain in Phoenix, so we took off about 1:20 late, but we landed in Seattle only 1:00 late. I got some possibly good photos of the mountains on the way into Seattle. Next is rental car hell (it always is) and then the drive up to Bellevue. I'll get to see many of the other Enforcers in less than a few hours. Whoo!

Got to Phoenix fine. Got wrangled by some credit card guys right by the gate. The ability to purchase up to two round trip companion fares per year for $99 each just by having the card convinced me to fill out their form.

lucklessone drove me to the airport. I got here at about 0345. There was some sort of problem with the ticket counter computer, but they were able to get me checked in and ready for security by 0410. Now I'm waiting because security doesn't open until 0430.

I'm leaving for western Washington tomorrow morning, early. Penny Arcade Expo for the first few days and then hanging out with various people up there. I'll be back in NM the evening of September 2nd. While I'm gone, I'll be able to post to LJ from my widget, but I won't be able to leave any comments or read any entries.

Instead of creating a physical logbook to keep in my Jeep with the service record and whatnot, I created an LJ to keep track of all that. (I know I'm a big nerd.) I doubt most of you care to read it, since most of the posts will be about details like how much gas I just bought or when I changed the oil, but here it is: 06wrangler.

( My Interests Collage! )

I'm going to Washington for a while starting next week. I need a ride up to the airport on Thursday August 24th. I need to be at the airport at about 0400 (yes I know that's really early, but that's the only way I could make my flights work out). Can someone give me a ride up to ABQ? Gas would be compensated of course.

Some of the people who live in WA know about my trip, some don't. I'll be at/working for Penny Arcade Expo in Bellevue until Tuesday August 29th morning. I have a hotel for those days. I was hoping to stay with the various WA people for the rest of my time (Tuesday night until the morning of Saturday September 2nd), and some of them have been asked already, but nothing is yet set. I have a rental car for the whole trip, so my getting around is easy, and if there are some nights when I can't stay with someone, I have the car as a backup.

Here is my flight itinerary for your reference:

Thursday, August 24, 2006:

Albuquerque International (ABQ) to Phoenix Sky Harbor Intl (PHX)
Departure (ABQ): August 24, 6:15 AM MDT (morning)
Arrival (PHX): August 24, 6:37 AM MST (morning)

Phoenix Sky Harbor Intl (PHX) to Seattle/Tacoma Intl (SEA)
Departure (PHX): August 24, 7:32 AM MST (morning)
Arrival (SEA): August 24, 10:29 AM PDT (morning)

--------------------------------

Saturday, September 2, 2006:

Seattle/Tacoma Intl (SEA) to Phoenix Sky Harbor Intl (PHX)
Departure (SEA): September 2, 11:15 AM PDT (morning)
Arrival (PHX): September 2, 2:00 PM MST (afternoon)

Phoenix Sky Harbor Intl (PHX) to Albuquerque International (ABQ)
Departure (PHX): September 2, 3:05 PM MST (afternoon)
Arrival (ABQ): September 2, 5:18 PM MDT (evening)

Friday night we can't go up to Albuquerque for the Imbri movie night because lalabob11 has to work Saturday morning. For people who can't/won't go up to the Imbri movie night, there will be a movie night at JPL, but I'm not cooking dinner because I'm not in the mood to deal with it.

Saturday night, lalabob11 should be off work by 8 p. m. Once she's off, we'll leave for Albuquerque to attend admiral_jc and faeflitt's going away party. We would like to stay with someone in Albuquerque that night.

Assuming we can stay somewhere in Albuquerque Saturday night, on Sunday, on the way home we'll stop in Belen at Auge's (a car dealership). Today I went for a test-drive in a Jeep Wrangler Sport. I'm going to go on another test-drive on Sunday to get a better feel for it. I liked it, but I'm not sure if I want to buy one yet.

A big hurdle was my uncomfortableness with manual transmissions, but my insistence that the next vehicle I get has one. The Wrangler I'm looking at is a 6 speed and is geared low for off-road use (all the Wranglers are). It being geared low is nice for me because starting from a stop (the situation when I and most people out of practice with manuals stall most often) is easy and I plan on using it primarily for off-road/camping trips. My test drive was only about 10 miles long, but I did have 5 starts from a stop and was also able to spend a bit of time in each of the 6 gears. I didn't stall at any time, and my only significantly rough shift was from 2nd to 3rd while making a left turn while being tailgated by an aggressive pickup.

Personal stuff:

Does anyone know/know of any NM attorneys experienced with poly and/or gay partnership legal issues?

There is a movie night tomorrow. lalabobo11 already picked the movie we'll watch, but I forget what it is called; it's something with Angelina Jolie that was made after Hackers but before she was really famous. We'll be making empanadas for dinner. Some will be spicy beef, some will be mild beef, a few will be mild apricot and a very small number will be spicy apricot. People bringing food to share is always welcome too.

I bought plane tickets and reserved a rental car for my trip to WA next month. I'll be flying in on August 24th and leaving on September 2nd. I've got a hotel reserved for Aug 24th through Aug 29th checkout. I'll figure out the other nights as the time gets closer (I have a bunch of friends in the area that I can probably stay with and some of them have already been contacted). The days I have the hotel for are the days I'll be busy with Penny Arcade Expo. The rest of my time up there is there for me to visit with people and do some touristy things.

Other stuff:

According to the IRS, in 2001 (the most recent year examined) the government lost more than $340 billion in uncollected taxes. This is money that is actually owed to the federal government — not money that taxpayers have been able to legally avoid paying through creative accounting or the clever use of loopholes. This is a substantial sum. It is approximately 20 times what the federal government spends on Temporary Assistance to Needy Families (TANF) each year, the main welfare program for poor families. It is 55 times what the federal government spends on Head Start and almost 100 times annual foreign aid spending for Sub-Saharan Africa. Alternatively, the taxes that go unpaid each year are 30 percent of what the federal government actually collects in income taxes (personal and corporate). This means that if the federal government could find a way to get tax evaders to pay their bills, then tax rates could be reduced for everyone by 25 percent, and the federal government would have the same amount of money.

Download Muppet Music! They've got lots of stuff, including almost all of the music from Fraggle Rock.

Also somewhat related to Muppets, a company is selling plush sex dolls that look kinda like Muppets with large breasts:
http://www.teddy-babes.com/ (NSFW)

Drawings of stereotypical fan convention attendees (specifically ComicCon):
http://storyboredom.blogspot.com/
Some of the drawings and descriptions are really accurate to the sorts of people I often have to deal with at cons.

I haven't tried it yet, but this thing is supposed to be able to figure out what song you're thinking of from you tapping the vocal melody with your space bar:
http://www.songtapper.com/s/tappingmain.bin
If it works, it would be useful if you need to find a song but can't remember anything about it but a few lyrics.

My stand mixer came today. I'll be able to make a full batch of CIA chocolate chip cookies now instead of needing to halve the recipe (maybe; it might still be bigger than the mixer can handle, but it's much better than schlake's 4 quart can do). Many other things will also be easier to make. Wooo!

There will be no movie night this Friday as JPL will be out of town for the night.

I'm not sure about my housemates, but at the very least, I won't be going up to admiral_jc's movie night tomorrow. I need a restful weekend and weekends where I travel aren't restful enough. For those not attending the other movie night, you are welcome to come over tomorrow (Friday) evening and hang out/watch a movie. I'm feeling lazy and won't be making dinner.

Question 29 made me giggle a bunch. I'll have the sound bite it references stuck in my head for my whole life due to how many times I've heard it (it's waaaaaay more annoying in person, loudly, hundreds of times a day).

If I still lived in NJ, I would have answered a few questions (the present-tense ones) differently and gotten a different result accordingly:

Monday morning we woke up a bit after 1000 so we could go out for a good lunch before I needed to be at the airport. We went to Momo's, a very good Italian restaurant (dexander's favorite restaurant of all time). I had a chicken breast filet with a slice of panchetta and a cheese-brandy sauce over it on a bed of spinach. dexander, being friends with the owner, got a copy of the previous version of the menu. He's going to make me a photocopy of it so I can try to back-engineer some of the dishes.

On the way to the airport we stopped at Fry's Electronics where I picked up the 4 capacitors I was missing for my speaker building project and also "Brain Age" for my Nintendo DS. "Brain Age" isn't really a game as much as it's supposed to be a fun way to keep your mind sharp. We'll see how I do.

My flights were uneventful.

lalabob picked me up at the airport and we went to Apartment Imbri to hang out until dinner. We ended up going to Eurasia Bistro (the place in the old Minato of Japan location) to try their fare. Everything was good (best miso I've had), but everything was kinda pricey.

Arrived at the dexander family home. Time 0955

Odo 170968
Gal 9.930
$30.18
Time 0814

Odo 170703
Gal 13.912
$41.17
Time 0318

We just got gas at the Smith's at Central and Tramway.
Odo 170418
Time 2251

Earlier we saw Stomp at Popejoy Hall. The show was fun.

Since I don't know of anything else going on and there aren't any conflicts for me at least, there is a movie night tomorrow.

Next week I'll be in Dallas, so I don't know if the rest of SJLP will want to host a movie night.

Azuma was alright sushi. The anago was the worst I've ever had (dry, tough and overcooked (eel sushi is cooked (to remove poisons, as I understand it))), but the rest was good. The amaebi sadly didn't come with heads. The unagi and white tuna (I don't know the Japanese for it, but it's what they substituted for toro when they said they were out of toro) were both quite good, but nothing to the otoro I had at Ninja a few months ago (I know Ninja isn't usually great, but the last time I was there, they surprisingly had the highest quality otoro I've ever had; it was fabulous).

After dinner we went to the dollar theater (it's within short walking distance to Azuma) and saw "Lucky Number Slevin" on baldjuglingogre's recommendation. The dialogue is very well written and near-constant. There is some gore, but it is neither overwhelming nor "the point". It starts well with a story of a betting fix followed by a few executions. The plot builds continually in increasingly interesting ways until the credits roll. It's one of the best movies I've seen in a long time.

A-Kon is in two weeks and the travel plans are pretty well figured out. This year I have a camera, so some of the silly people will have their souls sucked by me. Also my plans for the PAX trip in August are slowly coming together (Yay, I'll get to spend some in-real-life time with ladymarguerite (who's probably going to attend PAX) and the WA people in addition to working the most fun con I've been to).

Does anyone want to go down to El Paso and see Devo on August 17th?

The Optigan is a weird "instrument."

I just did my final 5 puzzles. I took 40 +-1 minutes to complete all 5. The sudoku took the longest (18 +-1 minutes) but wasn't hard. The "restoration" was the hardest, but took less than 10 minutes. The other three were easy. According to the rules, whoever solves the final puzzles fastest wins. I might be in the running for the prize.

I feel tingly now, the way I've felt after taking tests in school in less than half the allotted time. I think I did well but I also think someone with more sudoku experience would have done it faster. The winner is likely to have taken under 30 minutes. Hopefully they post the winner's time once things are over.

There were some catholic protestors outside the theater when we pulled up to buy tickets. I got a photo I'll post later.

Dinner at Johnny Carino's was nice for the six of us (alphamajor, dexander, scoffeepie, sweetanniehi, two_pi_r and me). With cannolis for dessert, I had a Sambvca and espresso. I should get some of each for the house (recipe, bottle and grinds).

We then went over for the movie. Most of the reviews I had read said the movie dragged and had too much exposition. I found it quite good with near constant intrigue punctuated by occasional fight or chase scenes. On the Netflix five point scale, I'll give it a 4. I (and most people, I believe) generally like movies that expouse views similar to my own (their own). The goal of the "Rector" was quite admirable although its achievement was left unclear (and doubtful) in the end.

I don't know what the puzzles will be like tomorrow, but assuming they have to do with the movie, I feel I will do well. I'll probably have a tough time with the chess puzzle, but we'll see. The sudoku-like puzzle (I'm assuming there will be one) will be tough, but doable. I have little idea what the other three will be or what their order will be. In the unlikely chance I win, I know who will share the prizes with me, but there may be an issue of not having enough vacation days to go on all of the trips without pissing off my boss (taking unpaid vacation days irks him greatly, but this is the sort of thing I would do it for).

The Loma won't have DaVinci Code on Friday. I can't find out for sure if the Los Lunas Starlight will have it on Friday until Friday, but I'd be really surprised if they didn't. Right now the only people I know of who want to go up and see it for sure are Pi and I. Do any people with cars really want to go up and see it on Friday?

( Driving related self-hate/drama-whoring ensues )