BunkBlog

So, I’m wandering through my httpd logs, and I notice that some folks have really funny machine names. What’s most interesting, though, is that a lot of the military domains are goofily named. For instance:

squid1.tacom.army.mil
jaguar.andrews.af.mil
centurion.warren.af.mil
viper.usafa.af.mil
B-Kahuna.hickam.af.mil

Alas, the vast majority of military domains, as most com and edu ones as well, are dull and cryptic. wrtc53254-139.westriv.com, anyone?
current_mood: silly

Yes, it is true, May has great significance as a commemorative month.

It is Masturbation Month.

Make a party this month to observe the event. Here’s some planning tips for you. hehe
current_mood: silly

I love Texas. I suppose it’s the same anywhere with a strong cultural identity, but I’ve spent more time in Texas than anywhere but California and Korea, so I’ll fixate on Texas.

There is a common phrase heard by anyone not from the South, when we are visiting Texas: “Where y’all from?” With major emphasis on the from, naturally.

My best “Where y’all from” story is one from a couple years ago. I was stationed in Texas, as an instructor at the intel school. (No, military intelligence is not an oxymoron, you cretin. Come up with a more original slam, ok?) We instructors would often go out to dinner together, when we were working evenings. This particular night, we went to the Catfish Corner nearby. Oddly, the Catfish Corner is not on a corner, and in fact is not even in sight of any street corners. But, it is alliterative.

So, we go to the catfish restaurant (and restaurant is a generous description), noting as we arrive that they are having an all-you-can-eat special on catfish and quail. I don’t eat enough to ever feel that “all-you-can-eat” is a good deal, but a couple coworkers did. So, Chip asks what quail tastes like, since his Ohio-born self had never tried such a delicacy.
“It tastes like dove,” replied the waitress, pronouncing dove in a way nearly impossible to describe in mere roman letters, but something like “du-uhve”. Extra long, with some breathiness in there.
“And what does dove taste like?” quipped friend Chip, while visions of the bird of peace bounced in my head.
“Where y’all from?”

It had never occured to her, apparently, that there was anyone who had never actually tried eating doves. Go figure.

.

OK, here I am, spouting about one of the few things I actually am an expert on for a change.

When you design your websites, or your LJ styles, here’s a very important thing to remember. Ready? OK, here we go…
Do not hard-code a specific point-size for your fonts.
Do you know how terribly annoying it is to change the font size setting and see no change? Maybe 8-point Arial Narrow is readable on your monitor, but I don’t run at 640×480, so 8-point fonts are TINY. The HTML standards include standard sizes, such as 1, 2, 3 or even relative sizes, such as +1 or -3. Please use them. Those folks running in a high resolution, as well as people with worse eyesight, will be very grateful.

Otherwise, I end up with two options: squint at the microscopic font, or discard all server font info and run every page in my fonts. Well, I LIKE other folks’ typography, just not itty-bitty fonts. Go look at some HTML primers, and stop using “8-point” as a font size.

/rant off

So, the FBI finally announced how often the infamous Carnivore email-snooping program has been deployed. During a 10 month period, they used it 13 times. Some civil liberties reactionaries.. er, groups claim that is too frequent. How often did they run wiretaps? Bet it’s more. Why are you more worried about email than phone taps? Or is it just the allure of the new? Seriously, most people are boring, so don’t worry about the FBI and the NSA snooping on your email: nobody wants to read it, including many of the recipients. Deal with it.

OK, so, when going to the US name generator, I discovered that, although my family name has been in the US since 1640 (130 years before there was a US), it’s not American enough. I guess we just have to breed faster. I am now Robert Greer.
current_mood: amused

To further prove my propellerhead status, I’ve been playing with my stats output. Yep, Added a graph and still made the HTML smaller. Pruned down the list of requested files, and added a graph showing where people are coming from.

Here’s a shocker: most folks are coming from LiveJournal to my site. A few months ago, most of my visitors came from Winfiles, but CNET has killed the site and not reinstated all the files that were listed there. So, my Linux Theme and startup screen have not been getting a lot of hits lately. Tux is lonely.

On my personal stats output (still huge, yes Corto), I find that the most popular PART of LJ that visitors are arriving from is (drum roll please) NakedParts. Go figure. Not that I’ve posted many nekkid pix there, but I guess my witty commentary is hard to avoid. My host has told me I may be charged 5 or 6 bucks next month for my profligate bandwidth usage. I think I can afford it. heh

OK, so I’ve finally gotten around to getting Mensa membership. Why did I do it, you ask? It looks good on a resume. At least, that’s what I’ve been told.

Why did I put off doing it for the past 15 years? Every Mensa member I know is an arrogant pain in the ass. So far as I can tell, the entire point of the organization, besides being able to tell people how wonderfully brilliant you are, is to make sure your kids are raised to be equally brilliant. It’s some freakin’ eugenics experiment, I swear.

I have absolutely no intention of ever going to a meeting, and don’t plan to submit any articles for their newsletter. Am I being a self-serving hypocrite? Well, probably, but at least it will be one more line on a resume. Self interest uber alles.

I really need to go to bed.

I have way too much time to waste. I’ve been spending it surfing through Live Journal. Seems reasonable to me.

Apparently, there is some requirement to post a long, interesting only to you, rambling kind of online conversation log in your journal every so often. I’m not sure, but it seems to be mainly observed by the high-school and college-age folks, with an occasional older person posting. Um, why?

I would think that the person on the other end of that private chat usually doesn’t expect you to archive and share that conversation with all and sundry. Perhaps I’m wrong in some cases, but I’d be willing to bet that most of the folks who have posted 300 lines from an AIM log file didn’t ask if it was ok to share.

If you shared someone’s personal snailmail, or recorded a phone conversation for the amusement of others, wouldn’t you find that rude? Are there different standards of civilized conduct online compared to the real world?

Do I need to get some sleep?

This album has been on constant re-play in my car the past few weeks. Well, ok, I did play a little Fuel and Prodigy occasionally, but “Bohemian Like You” has gotten MAJOR airplay…

How can you argue with lyrics like, “Itsy bitsy teeny weenie, ridin’ up your butt bikini” woohoo!
current_music: Dandy Warhols – Horse Pills
current_mood: happy

Cam’s up. In case anyone cares to see me surf and drink Pete’s

MSIE, although better than Netscape Navigator, is an infuriating piece of software.

Why, after 5 years, does IE still not support the progressive JPEG standard, yet proclaims itself to be a standards-compliant browser?
Why, every third web page or so (totally random that I can tell), does my font setting revert to “smaller”, a size I have never purposely set for any reason?
Why is Opera so much better and yet so much smaller a download? The absolute largest Opera download, including all bells and whistles such as email and ICQ messaging, tops out at 9 megs. The smallest MSIE download is about the same. Now, to get all the functions of Opera, you’ll have to download ICQ (3 megs) and an email program (anything but OE which is just a security hole – 3-5 megs).

Ah, the imponderables of the world. But, I’m sure MS didn’t abuse its monopoly power in any way. After all, the best product always wins, right?

Pete’s Strawberry Blonde is much better cold than warm. I guess I’ll just have to drink faster.

As promised (threatened?), I have a new, prettier stats page now.

Noticed another peculiarity: What the heck “browser” is Jennybot? Is Jennifer Ringley sending out her robotic minions? hehe
current_music: So I Married an Axe Murderer

OK, that’s it. I officially have the worst ISP ever. Their DNS servers seem to respond randomly. Now, the virtue.nu server is not found, but it was there this morning. I have a policy of supporting local ISPs, but I’ve never had one that SUCKED before.

Oh, Earthlink…

Yep, Earthlink works. Actually getting a 56k connection on it too, unlike C2i2’s “56k” lines which ran at 28k when they connected at all. Whew. Much better.

OK, so I decided to completely WASTE the day surfing old journals and following whatever links I may find.

Alas, so few people have discovered the usefulness of URL redirection services, it seems. Lots of broken links, all over the place. I guess I’m just feeling lucky that I gave folks the Bigfoot redirection URL before I got my own domain. Shit, the domain fees are due soon. 2 years so soon…

Yes I am a geek. So?
current_music: Limp Bizkit – Rollin’ (Airraid Vehicle)

OK, you absolutely have to go to Sluggy Freelance this week. He’s got some great Madlibs-looking stuff going on, with custom graphics and everything. I know Darkmoon has been playing, but today’s is the biggest yet.

Here’s my version. Gotta hate it when the spiny anteaters bite your gardengnomes off. hehe
current_music: The Offspring – Conspiracy Of One
current_mood: silly

I’ve totally reverted to my behavior from 15 years ago. Cool Ranch Doritos, Mountain Dew, and a computer. Back then, 64 k of RAM and a 270k floppy drive, now 384 M of RAM and a 20gig HD, but still the same online fetish and randomness. 🙂
current_music: Shaggy – Keepin it Real

Yep, the random test stuff has finally made it impossible to resist…

Turtle

Come on out of your shell – in your former life you were a turtle name Gifford. The details are a bit sketchy, but we do have a brief summary based on public records: You were born in a small pond beside a saloon. Despite having an exceptionally athletic father, you seemed to prefer sunbathing and mud baths to more active pursuits. Contrary to the rumor, your favorite color was never green, but actually blue. Few people knew that you were a talented poet because most of your work was destroyed during a flash flood that swept away not only your library, but your entire community. Fortunately you had the pluck to survive, settle down, make some eggs, and live happily ever after with your wife Melinda and your 20 offspring.
current_music: The Tubes – She’s a Beauty
current_mood: silly