No Hassle Hassles

Well, I managed to get my hackles up today. You see, I have this credit card from Capitol One which gives me reward points that I can redeem for credit to my account and other goodies, like coupons to Bennigan's (won't Butters be happy?). In theory, this is supposed to be quick and easy, and they even call the program "No Hassle" rewards.

Well, how is this for no hassles:

The online credit card site has a large advertisement about how easy "no hassle" rewards are, and a tantalizing display of how many points I've earned to date. OK. First question: If these are no hassle, where is the "redeem my points" button? These are part of my credit card account, after all. The points balance is right there, teasing me in all of its 4 digit glory. Hmmmm. Nowhere to be found on the credit card site. No related link at all.

The next time I log in, I notice that "rewards" is a separate function on the login page.
I select it, only to find that I have to sign up to redeem my points, generating yet another username and password to my continually growing list of 200+ entries in my Firefox database (signons2.txt, in your firefox 2 profile directory). So much for hassle-free.

Ah, but the fun doesn't end there! Oh no.

Once I have my account (which I signed up for several months ago), I today discover that there is a Javascript function in the code that prevents the browser from correctly remembering the login! No shit! Here are the lengths to which they went to make my "no hassle" login screen:

1. The Javascript copies the login name to a hidden form field (which users cannot see, but will be submitted).
2. It then replaces the text in the visible form field with all asterisks.
3. The browser now stores ******* as your username.

Now, when the user submits the form Firefox dutifully asks me "would you like to remember the password", but since the user name is corrupt and the hidden field is used as the real information, it fails to remember the correct information.

OK, perhaps we can turn off Javascript. Nope. It turns out that if you turn off Javascript, login fails because the hidden form field is not set (step 1).

So, in order to get the correct information into my signon database, here are the steps I had to follow in oder to get Capitol One No Hassle Rewards to remember my username and password correctly:

1. I Turn off Javascript.
2. Type in the correct information in the form.
3. Submit the form, and tell Firefox to remember the password. Since the javascript cannot corrupt the form, the correct credentials are stored, but login fails.
4. Turn javascript back on.
5. Log in again, this time telling Firefox to NEVER remember the passwords for this site so I wouldn't end up with the crappy **** entry in my credential database.

Now, after adding a bookmark so I can find the rewards site login page without having to navigate for 15 minutes every time, I can log into my rewards account with exactly the same level of difficulty as any other site.

I called the phone number to lodge a complaint, and was told that these measures were for "my security". OK, why is this done with my "rewards" account, and not my real credit card account (from which the point are derived) or my two online banking accounts?

Oh, I wouldn't want someone stealing my BENNIGAN'S COUPON! Oh My!

It certainly has nothing to do with the fact the redeeming rewards costs them money. Oh no, my no-hassle hassle certainly isn't about that. My Death By Chocolate extravaganza at Bennigan's is certainly being paid for by the cell phone SMS text messaging faeries.

You know, the ones that send you that mysterious, anonymous text message once a month? This explains why it costs me money to receive text messages, even when I didn't ask for the service and don't use it. After all, who is going to call up and complain if their bill is $0.05 higher? Let's see, (200,000,000 cell phones) x ($0.05 per faerie message) x (once a month) = $10,000,000/month. Enough to pay out 1,000,000 rewards members!

By the way, what do they do if someone gets mad and me and writes a program to send me 10,000 text messages? Oh, I'm sure they automatically detect this and credit my bill with absolutely no hassle.

Poor Neglected Blog

Well I, like others, haven't made an entry my blog for some time. I figured there was enough going on that I could manage to say something in my poor neglected blog.

Well, I have reached the next milestone in my education: my first scholarly publication! Not only that, but it actually made it into one of the better computer science conferences: OOPSLA (Object-Oriented Programming Systems, Languages, and Applications). If you have some understanding of programming, or you're just a glutton for punishment, you can read it here.

Next up: presenting the paper in Montreal. Not a bad gig: 30 minutes of public speaking for a week in Quebec. Better than a fork in the eye, I always say.

Yannis (my adviser) suggested that my original draft of the presentation was a little "plain". He said, "This is OOPSLA, people are going to have amazing presentations. Where are the dancing elephants?"

So, I've decided to use a segment of the GE dancing elephant in my talk with the intro "I was told that in order to impress OOPSLA audiences, you had to have dancing elephants."

Well, that's it for major events right now. Headed to Bend this weekend to hang out with Leslie, and probably do some adventuring. If I get into any interesting trouble, I'll try to remember to pass it on...

Saddle Soreness

I survived the ride.

We went north through Coburg, crossed the freeway, and stopped in Brownsville. The weather to this point was actually quite nice. I think it was due to the fact that I neglected to bring sunglasses because the weather prediction was so gloomy. It seems like the best way to change the weather is to be unprepared for it.

On the way to Brownsville there was quite a bit of grassy farmland (the valley here grows most of the world's grass seed, which is also why Eugene is site #1 on the government's allergy web site). These very large lawns were cut short, I assume from the previous harvest, and were quite a nice shade of green. Many of the fields had standing water, which was making large crowds of frogs quite happy. It had been a while since I had heard frog song.

We stopped in Brownsville, which has a really nice public restroom in a little park. I mention this because I found it quite amusing, in a "dead culture that doesn't know its dying" combined with a "one of us" kind of way. It was a pretty nice building (at least as good as the rest areas on the freeways). The amusing part was that on a Sunday morning these restrooms, which were in a town of about 800 in the middle of nowhere, were heated. I kid you not. It was warmer in the men's room than I keep my apartment. I have to admit that on a cold day I would appreciate the warmth, but only in the land of unrestrained consumerism could such a wasteful example of creature comfort exist. It was so...ridiculous. I'm surprised homeless people weren't fighting over floor space. Oh, but I guess they get the privilege of using the county jail...Don't get me started ;)

Anyway, back to the trip.

My legs held out pretty well to this point, and we made pretty good time. I think we averaged 16mph with stops. As we headed out of Brownsville the weather started to degrade. Within 10 miles it started raining, but it only lasted for about 15 minutes. Unfortunately, it was enough to chill my legs a little, which caused some tightening. I think we were nearly 50 miles in at this point.

Then we hit some hills. Normally, I do 50 mile rides in the hills, but my time off has really led to some muscle atrophy, and the quads really started to burn. Within a half and hour I was barely able to keep a 10mph pace on flat ground, and the wind was picking up. When it was at our backs we were fine, but it seemed to like our faces instead, and by mile 60 the combination of saddle soreness and muscle fatigue began to seriously hamper the fun factor. Also, we discovered that we had missed a turn, and were a bit lost. Well, Michal had his new GPS with him, so we knew our latitude and longitude to within 20 feet; but that doesn't turn out to be particularly useful in the absence of a map to tell you where the freeway overpass is located. Ah, data vs. information.

We found our way, but it was going to take another hour at my pace (roughly half that of a sedated sloth). We were headed to Michal's mother-in-law's house, where his wife was waiting for us with hot food. To my good fortune, she was driving support and had a bike rack on their van. (Actually, I probably would have turned back at Coburg had Michal not told me this was the case).

So, I called it quits and bummed a ride at mile 70, went and hung out with the in-laws, ate, and played with their dog.

Michal rode on at a much faster pace, stopped in for a quick bite, and continued on to finish 113 miles before dark.

All in all a good time. Though I am still a bit sore.

Weekend ride

I finally managed to buy some clothing that will allow me to cycle in the wet cool weather here in Oregon. Being a student means that I have to watch for deals at places like REI's scratch and dent sale.

So, to celebrate, I have decided to take a ride with one of the professors that I am working with at the University. He is doing a century ride in the morning (100 miles). The weather is supposed to be rainy and 40 degrees. It has been probably three months since I cycled anywhere.

I must have some sort of masochistic streak...

I am off to buy gatorade.

More Fun with Silver

I am almost done with my next casting. It is a rough carving of a woman in a dance pose (I think :) ). The thing is tiny, and I didn't do a lot of planning (i.e. no planning) with respect to what it was going to look like, so it basically ended up looking like it wanted to look. I still haven't finished polishing it, nor have I attached a ring to the top of it so it can be attached to a chain, but still you can get the idea. My camera isn't good enough to pick out the fine details anyway...The first is a front view, then a back view. Clicking on the images should get you a larger version.

Lost Wax, Gained Ring

I decided to take a lost-wax casting class this term for fun. Basically, you carve something out of wax, invest it in something akin to plaster, bake out the wax, pour in sterling silver, and end up with a metal trinket.

I finished my first piece last night: a simple ring. My intention is to eventually cast a hand-carved version with an embossed pattern. Right now I am just getting the kinks out.

Still, it came out pretty good. I ended up with a very small section that has some surface bubbles, but they are not noticeable unless you are really examining it. I couldn't get a very good picture just yet, but this will do.

Scratched and Dented

It's again time for the REI Scratch and Dent sale, and I again found some good stuff.

Several of us went two hours early, and got in line so we could get first dibs on the deals. We were not disappointed.

I was hoping for ski boots. They had more skis, but no boots. I did find warm cycling gear, so I am closer to being able to bike in cold weather. I also found a nice pair of convertible pants. The two best buys, as you would expect, were things I neither needed nor was really looking for.

The first crazy buy was an inflatable kayak (retail $600). I couldn't pass this one up. It looks brand new, but the tag said it has a leak somewhere (which are easy as pie to fix on these), and was priced at $50. If nothing else, eBay can help support my S&D habit.

The next find was a GPS (retail $350). This one was nothing to look at. It has scratches on it, and one of the main controls was broken (the top of the joystick came off), but still felt like it worked. It was priced at $25, so I was willing to take the chance. Turns out the thing works perfectly. I just played with it and there is absolutely nothing wrong with it except for being a little worn!

Altogether I got about $1,200 worth of clothing and gear for $150. Gotta love used stuff!

Selective Amnesia

I was talking to a friend of mine last night, and I realized that I had completely blocked out my other trip to Ray Benson Sno Park. I mentioned the other two in my blog below, but as I tried to remember what I had done on the weekend before that, it came flooding back to me in a rush of remembered pain and cursing.

That weekend the downhill area (known as HooDoo) was having a Try Telemark day, where you could try out gear for telemark skiing for free with a lift ticket. I went along, knowing that there were back country trails nearby (my knees don't take downhill very well).

It turns out that it had dumped about 2ft of new snow on the trials just a few days prior to that, and the Rangers were just digging out the parking lot shelter. No one had been on the trails yet.

Furthermore, I was alone, since everyone else who drove out wanted to do the downhill stuff.

I don't know if you've ever tried breaking a back country trail on skis, but I assure you it is made more difficult when you sink up to mid-calf on every step.

Normally, the snow is packed down well enough that even when breaking trail you only sink a few inches. After all, you're on skis that cover a lot of surface area. This, I found, it not the case when there is a lot of new powder.

So, I had to push my skis forward and rely on the bent tips to bring them back towards the surface. Of course, as soon as I put weight on the now emerging ski, it would sink back into the depths.

While this was rather slow going and strenuous, it was not all that bad on level ground. "Ah, but Tony", you ask, "weren't you in the woods? With hills and curves and evil nasty invisible snow worms, similar to those Kevin Bacon dodged in the sandy desert, that tried their hardest to make you fall down into the most awkward positions possible so they could come and eat your cold dead body???".

Unfortunately, yes.

Understand that this was probably my fifth trip skiing, and that the uphill parts were hard for me on a broken trail under good conditions. In these conditions, a very small incline would do its best to simulate the kind of hill that you normally drag roller-coasters up with chains.

You see, all of the traction on xc skis is in the middle. Little fish scales that let the ski slide forward, but tend to grip when moving back. If you cannot get weight on the middle, you get no traction at all and slide backwards.

Now, take an incline where you are sinking nearly up to your knees. As you put weight on the ski, where does the weight go first? The tips, which have been bent upwards as you have slid them forward. The spring of the ski then tends to lift the middle (where the traction is) off of the ground. So, as I would try to make progress up a hill, I would find myself suddenly sliding backwards.

The other techniques to get up hills are to walk with your legs wide, skis pointed outwards, or to turn completely sideways and sidestep up the hill. Unfortunately, the skis are not attached to your heels, so either of these techniques is very difficult in deep new snow, because you have to pick up the ski to move it forward. If you are side-stepping, this means the front of the ski comes up, but not the back. This, in turn, means that you are trying to drag a large, flat-faced object uphill through heavy, deep snow. This is not so bad to do for one iteration, but rapidly turns into a task with all of the charm and none of the cuteness of walking up a long flight of stairs with two four-year-old children attached to your legs.

Needless to say, there was much cursing. But the fun doesn't stop there! I haven't even mentioned falling!

Falling on cross country skis rarely hurts (I would say never, but my keyboard isn't made of a wood-like substance worthy of knocking on). The hassle is getting up. Your legs are attached to long objects, and you have to use your poles to hoist your weight around. You get the hang of it after a while, but it is very tiring.

Now, with skis sinking nearly a foot into the snow, you can imagine that the poles were sinking a lot more than usual. Probably two feet. This is not normal, and requires a lot of extra effort to lift them out as you make forward progress.

When you fall in these kinds of conditions, you start to think that hypothermia wouldn't be so bad.

Remember, you need the poles to move your weight around; however, every time I put more weight on them, they just sank deeper. Oftentimes you need to pull a pole out rapidly to balance yourself as you stand up. Not happening.

I went a total of about 1.5 miles in a little over 2 hours. I was trying to reach a snow shelter, but when I saw a big uphill section .25 miles from the shelter, I decided I'd rather ski through burning sulfurous pools in hell.

I tell you, the trip almost put me off skiing for good.

One might wonder: "and you went again the next weekend for what reason?"

Um....peer pressure?

On the plus side, I found that I was much better at it. I guess all of that struggling was good for something.

Fun With Research

I have settled into my new job as a research assistant. It is an interesting experience to have an office in an academic building where you also attend classes. Basically, I go in at 8 and leave at 5. During that time I read papers, do homework, go to classes, attend talks, and do whatever reading/writing/thinking that my adviser tells me to do.

I have my pictures hanging on my office walls, and my post-doc office mate has arrived from Germany.

Now if I could just get into my class homework as much as I am enjoying the rest of it...

Skiing Like a Madman

Well, I have officially graduated to moderately competent in cross-country skiing. I've been out in the snow for the last three weekends running, and am feeling pretty confident. I even went down a pretty hairy hill with bumps and all sorts of unevenness and didn't even break anything. Heck, I didn't even fall down.

The last two weekends I went to Ray Benson Sno Park, which is in Santiam pass between here and Bend. It is a bit of a drive, but the trails are great, as are their shelters. The only downside is that there are snowmobile trails. Nothing breaks up the tranquility of skiing through the woods more than unmuffled two-stroke engines spewing noxious gases. Aren't these things meant for transportation in the Yukon??? Ah, outdoor adventure for those averse to exercise. Don't get me started on Jet Skis.

This week I have started initiating trips for the UO outdoor program. Basically, you plan a trip, post it, and people sign up to go. The program gives the trip initiator (i.e. ME) free gear rentals. Score! They also have large vans you can rent, so if you get a big group you can all share the costs of transportation.

I am planning on taking a group night hiking up the Butte this week, and next week I am taking a group up Eagle's Rest to do some star gazing. I'm hoping someone has a telescope they can bring along.

In February they have Kayak practice sessions at the pool, so I am going to try to get competent at kayak rolls so I can suggest a sea kayak trip to the coast. I had planned to do some kayaking in the Sound last year, but didn't end up going. Looks like if I plan it right, I can do it this summer for a lot less than I expected to spend last time.

Blog in The Headlights

I've just returned from a week-long trip to Utah. Bubbles the Crag-Finding Wonder van survived the trip with only one more dashboard light illuminated than when I left, bringing the total to three (check engine, airbag, and oil change). They're good for making passengers nervous, so I try to keep as many of them going as I can before actually heading in for service.

I've decided I should start calling my van Sparky instead of Bubbles. I think I'll treat "Bubbles" as the van's Porn Name from now on. I'm not sure why I want to call it Sparky...it just seems to fit. Every time I find myself coaxing it through some rough spot, I find myself patting the dash and saying "Come on sparky!". So, there it is.

You might wonder how my van got the name Bubbles in the first place. The Crag Finding part is obviously related to climbing, and the wonder part has to do with the four-wheel drive.

Bubbles was what the previous owner had named it. Had they never told me that, I would have blissfully christened it something different, but once someone tells you a factoid like that, you either guard it like the formula to Coke, or find some way to make use of it. I certainly couldn't tell the story of the van's previous name without some social protection from the obvious soul castrating tauntings due a single white science-pedigreed male driving a mini-van that used to be called Bubbles; four-wheel drive or not.

Therefore I decided that I should keep the name. People don't taunt an intentional joke.

Sparky The Crag Finding Wonder Van -- Porn name Bubbles

Anyway, you might want to hear about the trip. Well, I was originally going to Utah to see some friends, and do some adventuring in some slot canyons. I had the wet suit for dealing with the short swims in cold water, all of the gear for doing the rappels into the various abysses, USGS maps of the interesting canyons, etc.

I talked to a park ranger in Zion National Park, and he described the conditions. I relayed these to my partner Renn. Renn decided he was getting too old to freeze his butt off in a canyon, and decided he'd rather not.

So, I ended up just going and visiting friends. I essentially hung out indoors the entire week.

Still, it was a nice trip. Saw some movies, ate good food, hung out with gay actors on New Years Day (my friends are heavily involved in Theatre). You know, the normal kind of stuff.

I am now, however, so lacking in recent exercise that I get winded on a flight of stairs, so my friend Danae and I did a little night hike up Spencer's Butte, which is a nice hour-long round trip hike up a big wooded hill South of Eugene.

I wonder what snow conditions will be this weekend...

Sunday Night Experiments

I often reach new heights of culinary excellence during thin times of the cupboard. Some of my best dishes were invented out of necessity.

Tonight was not one of those nights.

Some nights ago, I was experimenting with pizza dough. I've been using the same recipe for years, but I've been pining for a crust more like the one I have when I eat pizza at Vicente's in Portland. A bit more crisp and thin.

Anyway, I added more oil to the dough; too much oil. Luckily, I tried out a small amount before making pizza with it, and it was all wrong. So I saved it. I'm now reminded of a line George Carlin used in his "Ice Box Man" routine: "it's still good, put it back [in the refrigerator]. It'll turn up in something."

A couple of mornings I've tried making cinnamon rolls with it, and that was OK, but still not quite right.

So tonight you can probably understand that even though I was hoping for the piece de resistance, I think I was more resigned to knowing that it was probably just a coup de grace...I used the rest of the dough.

I decided it might be nice to use the dough as a base, some smoked mussels and feta cheese as a topping. Even now it doesn't sound bad. Well, it wasn't bad. But it had no flash, flair....or flavor.

Well, at least it didn't involve Blue Cheese. I still have nightmares about my last adventure in that direction.

Turkey, Booze, and Skis

Well, I went to a friend's house for Thanksgiving. They had about 15 people over, and plenty of booze; not to mention food. Matt cooked 17 pounds of potatoes for 15 people, not to mention a 23 pound turkey, stuffing, etc., etc., etc. We barely put a dent in it.

I, on the other hand, put a rather sizable dent in the rum punch, which is news, since I rarely drink. I fear the resulting photos. Case in point: their rowdy friend Candice (who can burp louder and longer than anyone, male or female, that I know) decided she was going to act like she had a strap-on, and kept chasing after me trying to simulate certain acts that I was not interested in performing. The audience was entertained. I escaped with only minor emotional scarring.

Today, Hans and I went skiing at Rosary lakes. It was a perfect ski day. The snow was perfect, as was the weather. I am not all that good at cross-country skiing yet, so I am a bit sore, but it was well worth it. The trees were absolutely laden with snow...ah, just look at some pictures.This one was early in the morning (probably around 9am). It was still cloudy, and I thought the lighting was pretty cool. Notice how the snow is stuck to everything, including the sides of the trees. Later on, we came upon this set of mini trees:

As the day warmed up, snow started dropping out of trees in large clumps. You would hear low, muffled thumps in the distance as clumps the size of your head hit the ground. We managed to avoid getting clobbered, but I had a few close calls:
The sky started to clear up later, and I took this very nice shot of the trees and sky:

All in all, a good trip.

Now I just have to get my homework done.

The Rain Man Cometh

Well, Halloween is over, and the rain has begun.

One of my professors just moved here from Georgia, and I've been trying to prep him for the winter. I don't think he believes me yet when I tell him he won't see much of the sun until we are well into spring. He keeps pointing to the averages that weather.com shows. I've told him to buy a nice rain hat, and get outside and enjoy himself despite the rain. I find that a bit of a positive attitude about being outdoors in the winter here goes a long way.

That said, I've had a hard time getting myself outside the past two weeks. I had planned to continue my riding through the winter, but I've been putting off buying the proper clothing that will make it comfortable, and I really don't want to do it if I'm going to be miserably uncomfortable.

I ordered a set of $300 prescription riding glasses, and when they came they were faulty (the rain guards wouldn't fit properly because the lenses were too thick...there's a nerd joke in there somewhere, but I'm not finding it right now), so I backed out. $300 for sport eye-wear was really hard for me to bite off in the first place, so I was actually relieved. However, I'm not sure how I'm going to see while riding. Then again, the clothing and gloves are probably going to top out around another $300. I guess I may just have to push for night hiking in hills several times a week if I want to stay in shape.

Time Change

Ah, I never remember the time change. Actually, I was thinking it was probably this weekend, but for some reason thought it was Sunday night, not morning.

My stupid phone alarm, which supposedely has a monday through friday wake-up call occasionally decides that weekends qualify under this constraint, and went off at 6:30. To make matters worse, said phone also does not set the time automatically...so it was actually 5:30.

Gotta love technology.

Speaking of technology, have you seen this lovely chesnut?


It's a solar-powered haloween lantern from Fright Catalog. Now, I have to admit it would be really fun to have this for my lawn (if I had a lawn) on Haloween. The big question that comes to mind is: where the heck do you put it the other 364 days of the year? Might be nice to epoxy it to the trunk of the car...

The other thing that I find interesting is this: Does it really matter that something I use once a year is solar powered? Does the pollution saved in batteries actually counter the additional manufacturing pollution it takes to make solar cells? Then again, why can't I just have a cord?

Land Line

So I was sorting through some old files today, and I found a picture that made me miss having a land line phone. It was so much fun to see people's faces when they would pick mine up and try to dial a number.


It was surprising (and unintentionally embarassing) that many people had a really hard time with this one, and I had to dial a number for people more than once. I guess it wasn't the nicest thing to do, but I did love the randomness of it.

Smith Rock

I went with Andreas and his wife Julie to Smith Rock this weekend.

For those of you who do not know of Smith Rock state park, it is a large rock formation (primarily volcanic tuff; compacted/fused ash) that is known throughout the world. It's sort of like a disneyland for climbers. It is located in the middle of Oregon, in the high desert near Bend.


Andreas is a lot of fun to climb with. He's an easy-going, friendly, and interesting guy. He's also a really good climber and knows many of the people that frequent the climbing areas. It's also kinda fun because he helped define a number of the routes in the park, and knows a lot of the people that put them up as well.

At one point his wife Julie was asking a group of climbers what the grade was on the route they were climbing. After she had talked to them, Andreas made the comment "You know you could have asked me, I helped set that route."

We had several highlights during the trip. The first was camping. Andreas has a friend who owns some land right next to the park, so we didn't have to deal with a large camping area filled with cars, and it was about a five minute walk to the trails that led to the climbs. Here is the view from camp.


The night sky views were awesome. Been a while since I've seen the Milky Way and shooting stars. The best my camera could do was the candle in my tent, and then just barely.


It was a little cold the first night. About 20 degrees F for a low. I had my mummy sleeping bag in true mummy mode. I left a hole about 3 inches in diameter for air. It was so cold that when I wanted something outside of my sleeping bag, I stuck my arm out of this small hole and groped for it like some synthetic unicorn worm.

When I woke up the next morning I noticed that there was a layer of frost on the inside of my tent from all of my respiration freezing to the tent walls.

We had a pretty good day of climbing. The daytime weather was perfect (sunny and 60), so it was quite crowded and we had to wait in line for some climbs.


Andreas' dad and both of Julie's parents drove out for the day to watch, and they got a good show. Andreas did Chain Reaction, which is a 5.12 climb that has a significant overhang. This is him on the last move.
It's a great climb to watch, particularly since he ends it by jumping off. The resulting fall (and belayer being pulled off of the ground) is quite a show. His dad didn't know what was coming, and talked about it for some time afterwards. Here are two pictures. The first is him taking the leap, and the second is the final position of him and his wife. Someone else was filming, so I hope to get a copy of that to post as well.



We had an accident later in the day. Julie had a gear mishap, and ended up having to catch a fall by hand (i.e. by grabbing the rope). She lost quite a bit of skin, but fortunately Andreas didn't hit the ground. A little disturbing.


We came close to leaving that night, since Julie was not going to be able to climb, but she convinced us that she could find things to do, so we ended up staying. Fortunately, Saturday night wasn't nearly as cold.

Sunday was a lot more mellow, and one of their friends, Leslie, camped with us that night and joined us for the latter part of the day. That was a nice relief for me, since I was pretty much done climbing by that time, but Andreas still had a number of climbs left in him. The did a couple of climbs in the shady east side of the park, including a couple that had some bouldery kinds of moves. This is Leslie following a route Andreas had just put a rope on:


I did manage to get a decent picture of me on a climb (Lion's Jaw):

Relationship Advice

My roommate, after giving me the following advice, noted that I've been getting some great relationship advice lately. She was talking about how her boyfriend sings made-up songs to her, and that they often involve the term "boobs".

"Now", she said, "it isn't romantic to just sing something like 'I like boobs'."
"No?" I ask, as if this had never occurred to me.
"No. It has to be something like 'I like _your_ boobs'. See, that makes it more personal, thus romantic."

The "great relationship advice" comment was of course a facetious remark based on some other "advice" she was privvy to. I was talking to my friend Jody the other day, and his significant other overheard my name and said something like "Hello Tony!".

Jody, not missing a beats, says "Audrey says 'Hi' (pause) SHUT UP WOMAN, I'M ON THE PHONE!"

He then resumed our conversation with "You may want to write that one down."

We talked little longer, during which time I mentioned a few things about dating.

We said goodbye.

Ten minutes later he called me back and said: "OK, Tony, next piece of advice: _Never_ tell a woman _anything_."
"Really?" I asked.
"Yep. If you do, they'll just have questions, and you don't want that. She wants to know more about this woman you're seeing."
"Ah. I see."

So we talked for a bit longer and satisfied Audrey's curiosity.

"OK, Tony, so what have you learned?" he asked.
"SHUT UP WOMAN, I'M ON THE PHONE!" I replied. "and, never tell a woman _anything_."

"Very good grasshopper." He said.

So, a few days later I was talking to him again. My roommate (who knows Jody and I pretty well) came home. She didn't realize I was on the phone and started talking to me. I told her I was talking to Jody. She said "Hi, Jody!", to which I replied "Sarah says 'Hi'....SHUT UP WOMAN, I'M ON THE PHONE!"

"Ah, grasshopper. You have snatched the pebble from my hand." was Jody's reply.

Spiritual Matters

Some recent conversations have challenged me to think about my current claim of being an atheist. I always considered the term to be appropriate, but I recently discovered that other people have a different definition of the term than I was using. You see, my own definition was cenetered around the concenpt of "One who does not believe in God", which jives with the dictionary definition, but once again I have been reminded that we don't all define words the same way, since withing this simple definition lurks a bit of potential ambiguity.

The fact that God is capitalized indicates that we are talking about the single-god theory of the universe, which in American (and much of western) culture tends to aim people's mind at Christianity. I resolved my internal conflicts about belief in that system a while back, which is why I came to claim the atheist moniker.

Even then I felt that the term might not be strong enough, as reflected in one of my email quotes (I have a program that inserts them randomly) which is:

When I told the people of Northern Ireland that I was an atheist, a woman in the audience stood up and said, "Yes, but is it the God of the Catholics or the God of the Protestants in whom you don't believe?".

-- Quentin Crisp

I hadn't even considered that the atheist moniker would conjure up notions that I was no longer curious about the mysteries of the Universe. Where do we come from? Where are we going? What is the purpose of my life? What happens when we die? How do I integrate spiritual experiences into my world view?

I still explore these, but I feel that my time is best spent on roads other than the christian one. I've followed that one far enough to know it is not for me. I've had as many spiritual experiences in a few months of meditation classes as I have spending nearly 25 years in church.

I see christianity and many other religions the same way now. A set of good underlying principles: Treat people the way you want to be treated, etc. They work and have been time-tested. I just don't give much credence to the "why" that they supply.

My interest in physics was inspired by the idea that through progressive study one could come to understand how the universe works. Wow, what a powerful and seductive idea! I think much of the popular culture's interest in physics is related to the same romantic notion: that a science which is so successful at controlling and predicting things must have some deeper answers and meaning.

I still love physics. There is so much that is beautiful and fascinating there, yet what I ultimately found in terms of spirituality was not what I thought I would find. You see, I realized that I was looking for a concrete answer to the questions that start with "Why". The deeper you get into physics, the more you realize that you have to let go of that notion.

Quantum mechanics has no "why", or for that matter even "how". It deals with things like "when", "where", and "how much". The second you try to ascribe a deeper meaning (i.e. an explanation to the question "why does it work that way?") a contradiction arises. You are left with a series of equations that work and can be tested over and over again, but the more you dig the more you find things that are not what you wanted in terms of philosophy.

It's actaully a lovely parallel to the idea of faith. Someone tells you the equations are true. You work a couple of problems and see that it works. This builds up into a belief system. I believe the equations work. Over years and years of re-applying the same principles and equations you build up an abiding faith that the equations are true, and pass that along to someone else.

Yet underneath it all the fact remains: you don't know why. The universe just works the way it works.

Perhaps this in itself is some indication that there are higher powers than ourselves. We ascribe a high value to our notion of intelligence and cognition because it sets us apart, yet even with this stunning ability we fail to grasp the "why" of it all. We seek to expand our minds in the hope that all will suddenly become clear. We sometimes follow those who claim or appear to know the way because we have not found it ourselves.

So in the end I'm happy seeking a better understanding of myself and how I affect the lives of others. Sometimes that quest happens through interaction with things that are considered spiritual. I've had wonderful experiences outdoors (my first trip to the Redwoods was one of the most spiritual experiences of my life). I've had very interesting experiences in meditation. More often I find that I gain better insight through conversations with people.

In any case, if it integrates well with my life and makes me happier, then I integrate it. If not, I leave it be. Perhaps someone else has a use for it.

So now I'm back to terminology. I tend to dislike the term agnostic, because to me it has christian overtones (or maybe it's just that it encourages christians to "help you" make up your mind). But now I realize that the term atheist may be too strong.

One of my favorite Monty Python skits involves this crazy executive who sequentially fires people around a table, first for liking his idea and being a "yes man", then for saying that his ideas are bad, then for being indecisive. Then he comes to the fourth man:

Larry	Right you. The one in the middle, what do you think?
Second Writer	(panic) Er... er...
Larry	Come on!
Second Writer	Splunge.
Larry	Did he say splunge?
First and Third Writers	Yes.
Larry	What does splunge mean?
Second Writer	It means ... it's a great-idea-but-possibly-not-and-I'm-not-being-indecisive!

I think when someone asks me about religion, perhaps I should stick with "splunge". It's sort of like being agnostic, without the western religious overtones.

Out of it

Wow, I'm a bit off lately.

I think part of it is too much packed into small amounts of time. I went climbing twice this weekend, rode a decent number of miles on my bike, finished homework for two classes, and tried to make some progress with my email software project at work. I also managed two dates, though I'm not so sure the quality of the second one was all that great.

Emre just came in and told me that I had already implemented a test case that I asked him to write. I didn't even remember doing it. I think I need to take a walk this afternoon and air out my head.

Couch Frisbee

My roommate and I have invented a new zero-exercise game: couch frisbee. Here is how it works: You sit on opposite ends of a couch, chat about nothing in particular, and toss a frisbee the two foot span between you.

We did this for two hours last night.

Of course, when you have a mis-throw and the frisbee rolls away from the couch, you just stare at it in much the same way as a dog whose favorite toy has suddenly landed on the other side of the fence.

Strange Dreams

OK, so what does it mean when you wake up and all you can remember is that your dream had something to do with an altar, ritualistic sex, and a toaster?

Probably that I'm reading too much non-fiction that examines existential philosophy of the digital age (Levy's "Scrolling Forward") and sexually charged fiction (Irving's "A Window for One Year") at the same time...that, and I like toast.

Newspapers

I recently got into a discussion about popular media. I mentioned that I didn't read the papers, and mentioned that I didn't really want to read about how some guy beat up his wife, or some guy robbed a quicky mart. The reply I got was "but what about the women who are getting beaten?"

Well, at the time it seemed a good point, and I couldn't exactly express why that point of view didn't work for me. Am I just too flippant about the world around me? Do I not care about women's rights? Don't we need to be informed about what is going on in our world?

Now that I've had time to reflect, it occurs to me that what bothers me about this sort of news is that when an issue is brought up, it is done so in an anecdotal sense of individual example with stress on the sensational, and not on the facts.

You see, I don't care to know the details of who hit who, what their names were, how the police got involved, how the neighbors feel, etc. It bears no relation to my daily life nor society in any tangible and meaningful sense, other than to tell a story: it is entertainment of marginally social value. I can get better from good fiction, and it doesn't make me as sad.

What I would love to see in a news publication is news presented in a format that allows me to make a difference in my immediate world. I don't care that John hit Sally (or vice versa) specifically because it is a past event that is already being handled by the current laws. It can only lead to reactionary policy that is driven by the emotions of the story. Not a good way to do anything.

We end up concentrating our energy on politicians who have to summarize a suggested solution that will fit in a sound bite because we end up so uninformed on the issue as to be unable to discuss it in a public forum: we lack the terminology, background, and concrete data. A politician can't present a good solution because we are too uneducated to understand it without that person writing a book on it. A catchy sound bite becomes the only option for the distracted (but entertained) masses.

Instead of a John beat Sally story, I would love to see articles that gather information from peer reviewed sources and present them in a way that helps me make informed decisions about things like policy and law.

I don't want just statistics; I want information about the kinds of things that are happening (not anecdotal instances), what is currently being done about them, and some reasonable evaluation of how well that is working. Does jail time stop the beatings, or is treatment more likely to help? What solutions do other countries pursue, and how well do they work?

We occasionally see stories with this flavor, but I have yet to see one that I find credible outside of a select few magazines and research journals. Credibility, unfortunately, doesn't seem to sell well.

End of Summer Blowout

Well, summer is now officially over, and school has resumed. I did, however, manage to have a really great four day weekend leading up to it.

On Thursday a friend and I went on a hike to Eagles Rest about 30 miles from Eugene. Good exercise, company, and views. The next day my roommate and I did Spencer's Butte. More of the same.

Saturday I got really ambitious, and went climbing, then did a 20 mile bike ride in the hills south of Eugene. By this time, my knees were starting to hurt. But oh no, the fun doesn't stop there. My friend Andreas called and said they were doing a climbing trip on Sunday. So, I went to Flagstone and did a bit of that.

The best bit of the latter trip was when Andreas (the best climber I know) got stuck on a route. I've seen the guy climb some seriously hard stuff, so this was a rare event. Granted, he had a cold and wasn't feeling well. I managed to get a set of videos, though my stupid camera (which only records 40 seconds at a time) ran out of space just as he did a risky move that he ended up taking a fall on.

They are small and low quality, but you can check them out using these links:

1. Stuck. Ends with half of the risky move that led to the fall. Darn.
2. Very rare cheating. (a little "french free" action)
3. Super-sweet leap (about 2/3 into the video).
4. Finish. Anticlimactic...see (3)

I may have some pictures of me coming from other people's cameras, but they are as likely to show me laying on the ground lazily belaying as they are to show me on rock...I was tired.

The Librarian

My favorite librarian recommended a fiction find this week called "The Librian". She said, somewhat jokingly, that it made her begin to wonder about some of the conspiracy theories out there. She also noted that it was touted as "Liberal Escapism". OK, now I had to read it.

The story is essentially a fictional, behind-the-scenes recreation of a Gore/Bush election, though the Gore character is a female character. Of course, it also plays on terrorism, the use of fear and the media, etc. It is less than a year old, so if you watch the Daily Show at all, you've probably had some exposure to all of the viewpoints.

The characters were a little shallow, some of them almost caricatures, but overall it was an enjoyable book.

Societal Collapses

I'm reading a book called "Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed" by Diamond. It's about past societies that have succeeded and failed (Myan, Easter Island, etc.), and includes a parallel view of our current world trends.

It is a pretty good read. The archeological details are good, though they are a bit too detailed at times (he even has a habit of repeating things in a way that seems tedious to me). Some of the information is quite fascinating, especially if you don't know much about the ancient civilizations he presents.

The parallels he makes between past and modern societies is enlightening as well, and the information he presents about current trends in resource use is a bit frightening, though he does a great job of demonstrating how some companies (like Chevron, surprisingly) are actually finding that being environmentally friendly is not anti-business, as some in the establishment would have us believe. Oil companies, at least, are realizing the prevention of spills and damage is cheaper than cleanup, and improves public relations at the same time.

I highly recommend at least scanning through this one. The history is interesting, and he makes a good case for being aware and active about our environment while being able to point out where the most productive changes can be made.

I also liked his fair appoach, in that he isn't vindictive towards businesses that are competing according to current laws, and are causing environmental damage as a result. His opinion, and I agree, is that a business in a capatalist environment cannot afford to do things in a fashion that is more costly than competitors. What is needed is a body of law that requires a better minimum conduct to which they all must comply.

Google Story

New non-fiction this week included The Google Story. The latter half covers a bunch of the financial stuff, but the early chapters are quite entertaining for those who like stories and anecdotes of nerds with a mission.

Bits of fun trivia included:

- When they used Michelangelo's David for the L in a stone-carved Google logo to commemorate the artist's birthday, someone who though they were changing the corporate logo wrote them an email saying "Rockman sucks!". (see http://www.google.com/holidaylogos03.html)

- For a while, they were getting anonymous emails that contained single numbers: 37, 43, etc. They finally figured out that someone was counting the number of words on their home page and tracking the changes.

- The guy who works on the filters to keep unwanted content from inadvertently appearing in your searches is known as "Porn Cookie Guy", due to the nature of his job and the fact that he handed out homemade cookies to coworkers.

- In early (well before Google was a household word) observational studies of user behavior, they told users to go to the site and try to reasearch a topic. They were confused by users who would type in the site URL and then sit and wait. So many people did this that they finally started asking why, to which the user's replied "I'm waiting for the page to finish loading". They were so used to the extremely noisy pages, that they figured it was just stuck and still loading.

The first half of the book is a fun read for just about anyone. The latter chapters will appeal to the business-minded.

Digital Scales

My friend Renn gave me a nice digital scale last year that does body fat and water analysis, has a nice big readout, and a memory for your stats so you don't have to input them every time.

He got a whole stack of these things from Wal-Mart when they had them mis-entered into their scanners, and the $40 scales were ringing up for something ridiculous like $4...He bought their entire stock, then didn't know what to do with a dozen digital scales, so he started handing them out to friends.

What can I say, he's a quirky guy. Who am I to talk?

So I was trying to weigh my head the other day, and I realized that digital scales are not all they are cracked up to be: My head is evidently too light to register.

"Why?", you are probably asking.

The very obvious and logical answer to this question is: "I don't know." I just got curious about how heavy the human head is. Nothing gruesome like "I wonder how heavy the basket was after a day at the guillotine?"; just general curiosity.

I normally would have just looked it up, but I don't let myself have Internet access at home (I have to have some non-geek life). Now that I have your curiosity up, I found this online:

------ http://danny.oz.au/anthropology/notes/human-head-weight.html -----
I couldn't find any references for this online, so I asked around my workplace (the Department of Anatomy & Histology, University of Sydney). The most convincing response came from the service room where the technical officers actually cut up the bodies:

"An adult human cadaver head cut off around vertebra C3, with no hair, weighs somewhere between 4.5 and 5 kg, constituting around 8% of the whole body mass."

-----

2.2 lbs/kg means about 11 pounds.

So now you know.

The Hills have Gravity

No, I didn't fall off the face of the Earth (or a cliff for that matter). I have been ramping up my get-in-shape-or-die (maybe it should be and die) program. On Thursday I went mountain biking again and noticed that after a big hill I was able to recover pretty quickly.

Later, I was talking to my research advisor (who does a lot of cycling), and he showed me a Lane County (where I live) cycling map. He said the a good hills route was out Dillard Road to highway 99, south to Creswell, over to Lorane highway, then loop back to town. Sounded good.

So, I get up Saturday, go to REI (I needed a few things for a distance ride, like a portable air pump). I left at about noon and headed towards Dillard road. For those not in the know, Dillard road is a bit steep and curvy. By the time I got to the top I was pretty tired, but I figured I was just getting warmed up. There was a bonus near the top, too: ripe blackberries. So, I took a break and ate berries.

The next segment (about 9 miles) started with a nice downhill section, followed by mostly flat terrain. I settled into the groove and felt pretty good all the way to Creswell. From there I headed west, and the road began to get hilly as I expected. Still, it wasn't so bad. About 15 miles into the trip I found an old pear tree next to the road which had some killer pears. I filled my bag, and ate one while riding on. By this time I was getting a bit hungry.

A few miles later I hit a bigger hill. My pace plummeted. I got about halfway up, and decided to stop for lunch. There was a nice spot on the inside of one of the curves that had nice moss-covered rocks and plenty of shade. I ate a sandwich and some popcorn I was carrying, along with another pear.

After my break, I struggled the rest of the way up the hill, and was very glad to reach the top. The descent was a blast. There were almost no cars on the road, so I took over the lane and sped down the hill at what was probably at or over the speed limit. The curves were great.

The next few miles had hills, but none to compare with that main one. When I reached Lorane highway the traffic was a little heavier, so I was glad when I was able to turn off and head for Eugene, though I was a bit worried that the sign said "Eugene 16". I was pretty tired by this point, and my legs were beginning to rebel.

A few miles of relatively minor hills later, and I came to Fox Hollow road. I turned onto this one with relief, knowing the road heads right to the south hills where I used to live. I hadn't realized at this point that I was 6 miles from the top of the hill.

I had never taken Fox Hollow to its end. I knew it was a big hill because I used to live off of it, but I didn't realize that Fox Hollow road would more appropriately be named "The Hill that Never Ends". It started to climb. My legs were already Jello. It kept climbing. I began to cramp.

I probably walked almost as much of that hill as I rode. I was never so glad to see the top of a hill as when I reached the top of this one. Luckily, there were no more uphill segments of note for the rest of the ride.

I got in at about 5pm. My friend Amanda called to see if I was up for a night hike with her and Matt up Spencer's Butte that evening. I said sure, but I was gong to be walking pretty slowly.

I cleaned up and at about 7pm I decided to take a nap. My alarm went off at 8pm, and there was no way in hell you were going to get me to walk up any kind of hill. I called and cancelled. I managed to drag myself out of bed this morning at around 10.

Cannon Beach Bonzai!

My plans to go camping and climbing with Andreas et al. this weekend were somewhat cramped by the University mail conversion this weekend. I couldn't leave until Saturday afternoon. I talked to my friend Gwynne in Portland, and she was planning to go surfing on the coast and could not find anyone to go with her either, so I decided to give that a shot.

It was hot in the valley, and once we got to the coast it was at least 20 degrees cooler. Very nice. Unfortunately, Cannon Beach was socked in with fog. Well, I say unfortunately, but we had brought mountain bikes as a backup, and decided to ride those instead. We found a trail that was clearly marked "no bikes" and rode that. Gwynne was initially paranoid about getting a fine until I reassured her that since it was my bone-headed idea, I would pay any fine. She relaxed and enjoyed herself.

Well, initially I'm not sure how much either of us enjoyed ourselves. The trail went straight up at an unrelenting pace, and we gained at least 1000ft of elevation in a little over a mile. There was a hike-in camp at the top, which we have to remember for some future visit: it had little shelters and such, and since it was a hike to get to it, it wasn't full, even on Labor Day weekend! Score.

So now came the really fun part of the ride: going down. The trail was a loop. The part we went up was on the back side of the cliffs that are exposed to the ocean, and as we climbed out of the fog it got seriously warm...of course the pedalling was adding to our heat generation. We had already peeled our outer two layers and were sweating.

We went down the trial on the cliff side, and it was a blast. I am sure I just about wore out my brakes. Once we descended into the fog it was even better. We cooled down very quickly, and the views were spectacular (we could not see the ocean for the fog, but the old growth forest looked really neat, and there were some really big trees).

We finished our evening with a picnic at the beach, and then headed for our camp. Gwynne, knows some people on the coast whose private driveway ends past their house at the top of 100 foot cliffs over the ocean. So, we drove there and set up camp. We still had a lot of fog, but we could see the sky, and it was nice to have solitude on a holiday weekend. The drive ended a good 100 yards past the house and around a corner, so it was like having our own private campground. The only downside was the dog poo: the owners have two big dogs. Gwynne managed to "stumble" onto some while setting up the tent.

Once we were set, we cooked tapioca pudding and read stories from "Surely You Must be Joking, Mr. Feynman". We're both such Physics geeks.

I didn't sleep so well: my bag was too warm for the air temperature, but it was too cool not to have it. Also, the grass or something made it difficult for me to breathe. I was half dead when we got up Sunday morning, and was not necessarily looking forward to being in cold water.

We got up, ate, and headed for the beach. It was nice and sunny, and we had two body boards, a surf board, and wet suits. The wet suit was very warm, and I didn't end up feeling cold at all. In fact, Gwynne took the thinner one, and she got cold well before I could even tell the water was cool. We later realized that we had gone body boarding last labor day weekend on my birthday, and we were about to start a tradition, since it was again my birthday...funny, it being annual and all.

I had never been surfing, but as I watched Gwynne, it didn't seem all that hard. After a little while I figured I better give it a try. I caught five waves, and managed to stand up on the board three out of the five times! I got some mad balancing skills...

By about 1pm we were exhausted, and Gwynne needed to be back in Portland by five, so we packed up and headed east. We found another nice mountain biking trail on the way, and stopped to check it out. It was a bit rougher that the one from Saturday, and not as pretty, but still a hell of a lot of fun. It was another steep uphill battle, followed by a downhill blitz. Definitely time to get new brake pads now. I noticed this morning that my handlebars are also misaligned...like I said, it was rough. I slept about 12 hours last night.

Today: rest day.

My Roommate has good eyes, or just knows me too well...

So my roommate was reading my Blog (she is currently in PA on an internship...scratch that, her intership ends today...she is headed to NY with her boyfriend), and she noticed two more fun things (i.e. things to make fun of) about my picture from my previous life: Not only was my hair a disaster, but I have a cheesy porn mustache (which in her words "wouldn't even grow yet") and am wearing what looks to be a calculator watch (I can't tell from the photo, but if it is I assure you it included a square root function).

Feel the love.

Non-fiction find

This week I asked a librarian for recommendations on books to read and she came up with "Swimming to Antartica" by Lynne Cox. It is an autobiographical account of the author's experiences as a long-distance swimmer.

Now, I am not much of a swimmer myself. I owned a house with a pool in Arizona (where it gets hot enough to melt most solids, including me) and I went in that pool a grand total of about three times in three years. It was great for the resale value and for my two dogs, but I just wasn't into it. It was also a major pain in the ass, especially when you don't even use it: balancing chemicals, vacuuming, skimming. Like I don't have enough to do without maintaining a 10,000 gallon bacteria breeder. I grew snails in the thing at least once. I finally wised up and paid someone else to deal with it.

So, when the librarian suggested it, I was a bit skeptical as to whether I would like it. But the librarian seemed like she really enjoyed it (and I'm such a guy (brainless automaton) whenever an attractive female tells me anything...I once roller-bladed my shins into a railing at some ungodly speed and limped home with lumps the size of walnuts because a cute skater passing the other way said "the hill is not so bad" when she saw me inching my way down the hill while holding a railing).

Well, it turned out to be a really great book. I wasn't familiar with the author, but she broke the men and women's world record for swimming across the English Channel when she was 18. She then proceeded on a series of impressive self-invented accomplishments, some of which had never been done by a woman, and many that had simply never been done (like swimming across the Straits of Magellan in insanely cold water and conditions that sink ships). The author has a great writing style, and a really vivid memory of all of the experiences she relates, which is understandable when you consider that most of them would kill an ordinary human, and regularly do.

Highly recommended reading.

Blah! Long day!

I feel like I've been running a marathon, and I've just been sitting in my little chair at work. Lots of things going on this week.

And I need a haircut.

Well, I guess I've needed one worse, like this time:


What the hell was I thinking? Ah, like any other teen I was thinking about being a rock star or something. I swear I didn't pick out the curtains.

Hey, but great monitor, though, wouldn't you say? B&W with an old-school tuner knob. No wonder my eyes are so bad now.

Can anybody name that killer machine with the blazingly fast floppy drive? Here's a hint: it wasn't made by Apple or IBM, and it had a Motorola processor.

Math Challenged Moment

OK, with a degree in Physics you think I could do arithmetic, right? Nope. My little dots in my last posting cost me $10...which tranlates to about a dime a dot. OK, so they shouldn't do a little dance or glow.

I realized this as I was falling asleep last night. I also realized that it looks like the map has a bad case of acne. Poor earth, it even has bumbs on its Netherlands...

I am tempted to update my mouse cursor to a little animated hand with thumb and index finger extended, making a pinching motion...

Ah, lucid dreaming. What strange things may come.

Pretty Dots

Update on the Ad campaign. I now have lots of pretty dots all over the world. 98 of them to be exact. Let's see, that's about $1 a dot. I think they should dance or something for $1, don't you? Glow, sing a song...something.

Still with the Living

Well, I've been kind of out of it this week. I was supposed to get some research done, and I made a good starting effort; however, it degraded and I ended up reading the user's guide for a new version of Vim (a programmer's text editor, for those not in the know). I did manage to play with a few of those features while pretending to look at code involved in said research.

I think I need a vacation.

Oh! I didn't die yet, so I guess this means that my nose bleed from last week truly was meaningless.

My routine trip to the library's non-fiction isle didn't yield anything particularly interesting, so I ended up wandering the stacks. I found a book on the history of the plague called "Black Death"...who can resist? I'm such a sucker for doomsday stories. In fact, I remember a book my sister sent to me called "The Doomsday Book" by Connie Willis. Nice piece of fiction.

Anyway, the author of the present book is one of those mid-eighties history professors that uses a few too many big words. Admittedely, I sometimes do that myself, but I found myself scanning ahead and mostly reading the really horrible parts, like how many people it killed in such-and-such a place. There was a great spot where he covers previously scary illnesses, like leprosy. Ah, necrotic tissue.

So I returned that one today and somehow ended up looking for something on the suicide of Kurt Cobain. I came to my senses before I checked anything out, though I hummed "Come as You Are" all the way home.

How twisted is that?

The Ring causes Nose Bleeds

So my roommate Sarah had told me at some point in the past years that she thought "The Ring" was a pretty good scary movie. I was at the used CD store the other day, and they had a whole bunch of DVDs for $2.50, which is cheaper than a rental, so I bought an arm load of them; one of which was the aforementioned title.

Saturday night I was a bit tired. You see I had gone rock climbing on Friday, I did some cycling on hills Saturday morning before the REI sale, and I hadn't slept well friday night due to after-dinner bloat. So I figured I'd give it a shot.

The movie was OK. I particularly like how they twist up the ending (the scene where the little boy reacts to his mother's report of how things went is pretty cool).

Another friend called me just after the movie, and we ended up talking until like 1am. I wasn't very awake, so I'm sure I wasn't that great at conversation...it gets to the point that I keep forgetting that the other person can't hear me nodding. So much for being tired and getting sleep.

So, I had promised Andreas that I would go climbing with him Sunday morning at 8am. Needless to say, I was looking forward to getting at least the remaining seven hours as sleep.

Around 4am I wake up. The area around my apartment is not so quiet, so I figure it was just a noise outside. I roll over, and feel a stream of blood roll across my upper lip.

Great.

I used to get nosebleeds all the time as a kid, so I am pretty used to it. It is particularly bad in the midwest during the winter, when staying in a house with forced air heat. I bleed daily in that environment. Oregon is quite a bit more humid in the winter, so I rarely get them here, except during some of the drier summer days.

This was the worst one I'd had since I was 10. It reminded me of that Monty Python skit where the guy who builds slaughterhouses is trying to sell his design for a retirement community. "Oh, I guess I misunderstood your attitude towards your tenants". Visually, it was more like the skit where they are picking on Sam Peckinpah films. One of them throws a tennis ball and chaos and blood ensue. See http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0650989



Of course, I can't help also thinking about the movie I just watched, wondering if I have seven days to live (in the movie everyone seems to a bloody nose in the course 7 days of events leading to their deaths), or if the fact that I fast forwarded through parts of the movie means I have less.

I go back to bed and end up in a series of lucid dreams. The only one I even remotely remember involved a woman who had actual-size big-leaf maple leaves tatooed all over her body in red and green. Don't ask about the plot; I'll claim not to remember it.

I get up at 7:30 to trek over to the columns for some climbing.

The photo shows the area I was climbing in. I warmed up on the wide crack (6 from the left) known as "outer column jam" or simply "fat crack". It is easy enough that my friend Andreas (who has been climbing for over 12 years) free soloed it to set up our ropes.

My next climb was a burly one, fourth from the left. I was still pretty muddle-headed, and was hoping that something a bit more challenging would help wake me up.

Now, when Andreas and I climb, we usually self belay and climb at the same time so we can chat. We use ascenders, which will move up a rope, but not down.

You have to be somewhat careful that you don't accelerate onto an ascender, because the grabs the rope with little teeth that can damage the rope. So, if you get to a sketchy spot, you kind of relax back onto the rope as opposed to falling.

Note to my sister: you might want to skip the next paragraph :)

Well, I get to the crux of the climb, and I can't pull the move. So, I go to relax back onto the rope, and notice that the rope just freely slides: I had forgotten to engage the mechanism that stops the rope from sliding. Lucky I didn't actually take a fall. At best I would have gotten rope burns from a panic grab of the rope.

I decided I hadn't had enough sleep to be climbing, so I finished that climb and then just watched Andreas and tried to soak up some of his techniques.

The day was acutally quite pretty, and once I got home I hated to waste it (especially since, according to my nose and morning in general, I have less than 6 days to live), so I called around and my friend Jody agreed to ride the Row River trail out of Cottage Grove. It is an old rail bed that they paved over and turned into a cycling trail. I'd never done the whole thing (it is 26 miles round trip), and it was nearby. It goes around a nice lake, and is graded for a train, so even though it gains elevation you hardly notice it.

I didn't realize it at first, but my friend Jody worked for the lumber company that sold this rail line, and was one of the major people involved in the deal. He had some interesting stories about it.

Once we got past the lake Jody warned me that we were headed into Appalachian country. Now that I think about it (and have witnessed it), I guess it makes sense. If you live in the middle of nowhere, and don't mind a railroad going through your front yard, you probably don't have really high standards for social graces either.

He told me that there was a lot of opposition to turning it into a trail. My comment was "but their property values must have gone way up", and "who wouldn't prefer a bike trail over a rail line?".

His response was that the kinds of activities that went on up there were the kind that did not appreciate outsider spectators. He said the company kept armed guards during the deal because they were getting death threats.

The major work in that area from 1920 to the time of the sale was timber. The rail served the timber industry, and when the area was logged out you went from the wild west with jobs to the wild west without jobs.

Jody told me several stories from when he was dealing with the land, including meth kitchens in trailers illegally parked at the end of the trail. He said they paid a fee to have the Sheriff make rounds out there while they still had unsold equipment in the mills. That got them one drive through a week.

We rode past the end of the trail, and stopped to eat some wild blackberries. Wow, they were really good, especially the ones that were warm from the sun. Like warm berry cobbler.

We decided to ride a little further on the road towards an area called Wild Wood. As we rode up the road, a woman tending her yard called out to me:

"Look out for the Crazies around the next corner."
I smiled at her.
"No, really." she said.

Jody and I decided to head back. No need to accelerate my demise any more.

On the way home I noticed some dead animals along the road. What one would normally term "road kill". I'm not sure road kill is supposed to include things one shoots from the bedroom window that faces the road.

I was happy to see the lake again.

Scratch and Dent - Score!

My friend Matt camped out in front of REI last night. They are having one of their scratch and dent sales today, and Matt is an absolute sucker for bargain outdoor gear. Admittedely, so am I, but I'm not quite up to spending the night on the sidewalk in front of the store; that and I didn't need anything.

About a year ago we went 3 hours before the store opened and were first in line, and I stocked up on all of the gear I could think of. I still haven't even used the 4-bike rack I bought at the last S&D sale (it requires a hitch, and I haven't ponied up the money to install one yet).

A frequent REI shopper might counter with "Ah, but it's REI, you _always_ need something".

They would be right, as long as you interpret "need" as "want".

I was going to drop by this morning and hang out with Matt for a few hours before the store opened, but after that beef and wine last night I had trouble sleeping (I don't drink much, and small amounts of alcohol act about the same as caffiene on me), so I slept in.

I got there late enough that I didn't have to stand in line. Matt was on his second trip (he'd already checked out once, loaded the car, and gone back in).

I was kind of hoping that most of the good stuff was already gone. Like I said: I didn't really need anything, but once you start finding deals you're not getting out of there without dropping at least $50.

So, what did I score, you ask?

The first thing I found were some chipped clip-in bicycle pedals. Normally $70. I have been thinking about upgrading, and damaged-but-working goods are great for trying things out. How much? $2.93. I think I can manage that (he says while trying to ignore how much shoes and cleats will cost).

Next, I found a nice gel-filled bicycle seat. Perfect condition. Looked like it had never been used. $20. I consider this my most practical find, since my current seat is torn and slowly losing stuffing.

As I walked from the bin with the bike parts, I saw a pair of cross-country skis. I like x-country skiing, so I figured I'd take a look. These were damaged as well (the tips were starting to separate, and needed some epoxy). Otherwise, perfect skis: no visible wear. Metal edges. I looked at the tag:

$0.93.

Yes, a buck for skis! Epoxy here I come! The check-out guy did the same double-take on this deal as I did.

I looked for ski boots. Nothing in my size, but I did score a $120 pair of ski pants for $40.

Total damage: under $70.

So, I left with an arm load of stuff and a list of things to buy at the next sale, which I have already found out is in October...

I'll have to ask Matt how comfortable that sidewalk was.

Slab-O-Beef

Yesterday was relaxing. I hung around the apartment and smoked some beef brisket on the grill. I'd never tried it before, but I had my friends Matt and Amanda over for dinner and Matt said it was some of the best he'd had. I used trusty hardwood charcoal, and soaked some sticks in water to make the smoke. I was worried that I would end up with shoe leather, but after 5 hours of slathering it with my homemade BBQ sauce (I can't stand the corn-syrup based stuff from the stores), it turned out pretty darn good.

It was good left over this morning with eggs and toast...

Weekly non-fiction

OK, so my weekly trip to the library's non-fiction isle this week yielded "Unhooked Generation", a relationship book about why so many Gen-Xers have trouble with long-term relationships.

It wasn't exactly written by a Ph.D. psychologist...the author used to work for Oprah. I admit that I came close to putting it back when I learned that (I'm not much into TV culture anymore), but I had read enough to notice that she did have some interesting points. I think one of her better points was that we need to throw out the "checklist". We've become such a consumerist culture that we think we can find relationships like we shop for cars and computers. Sites like match.com (where you chose everything about your potential mate's appearance except for cup size and penis length) don't help. It ends up undermining the whole process because even if we do find someone that matches a good portion of the overspecified and sometimes conflicting checklist, the second you run into problems you have a tendency to think "well, maybe I can find something that matches the list better", instead of actually working to resolve problems and build a relationship.

Anyway, not a bad read. Most of her ovservations and conclusions are based on a large number of interviews she did with people around the country (she is a Journalist by training), and it was good enough that I read it in one sitting.

More fun with Ads

OK, so my advertising skills suck.

I got such a low hit rate on my ad that google raised the price per click for the keyword that was getting me the most exposure: "webmail". I got 11 clicks, but only after almost 7,000 displays of my ad. They want $0.50/click now in order to show it with that keyword.

The analytics are kind of nice, though. You add some stuff to your web page, and it causes your page to report statistics back to google, which they then plot, as shown here:


It is certain that my free account on freshmeat.net is getting me boat loads more traffic than google; and much of the google traffic is almost certainly unrealted to my ad, since it only got me 11 clicks.

Play play play.

Fun with advertising

OK, like I need another hobby.

I was playing with Google today, and saw the AdWords link in tools. These are the little ads that show up whenever you do a search in Google. I started playing with it, and decided it wouldn't hurt to drop $30 or so just to see the internals, so I signed up.

Now, what to advertise? Well, I've been trying to drum up support (i.e. users who have a vested interest in helping me) for my web mail client. So, I figured that would be as good as anything else.

You set a "bid" for what you are willing to pay for a click-through, and also budget the max amount you want to spend. The rates run from about 5 cents to $1, depending on factors like how well your ad matches the keywords you are trying to associate with.

Whenever one of your designated keywords is searched for, Google displays your ad...well, that is not quite right. It is also based on whether or not your current budget is already spent for the day and other factors...they aren't really clear on why they decide your ad should show.

I'm going for the big $1/day, so at best I'll get about 10 click-throughs a day. It tells me that my current click-through rate is about 0.25%. The Impr. field (in the image here) tells you how many times google has displayed your ad.


BTW, please don't click on my ad for fun :) I'd kinda like to get real traffic. If you're reading this and are interested in my web mail client, just go to alphamail.uoosl.org.

Ani with Xylophone

So, I went to Ani DiFranco last night in Veneta. It was a pretty good show, but I was a little disappointed that her percussion section on this tour is a guy with a xylophone, a cymbol, and a bass drum. It was interesting, and Ani does a lot of driving rhythm with her guitar, but I was a little disappointed.

The venue was Secret House Winery. Silly me, I figured they had at least a covered amphitheatre. Nope. The backdrop of the hastily constructed stage was a wall built of bales of hay, and the "seating" was a dusty field. I usually don't go anywhere without my trusty hat, but wouldn't you know it: I let my guard down and ended up sitting in the sun for two hours without it.

Ani commented that her "dressing room" was an old shack that had the "tangy" smell of cats.

Well, now I know.

On the plus side, if you are prepared (folding chairs, blanket, hat), the overall ambiance was quite nice. Good scenery. Cozy crowd. Strangely attractive radical lesbians; ah, forbidden fruit squared.

Not-so-white water rafting.

Note to self: White-water rafting on the lower McKenzie in August after all of the snow melt is gone and the river is low: not so exciting.

Israel...continued

OK, so now I've had a personal experience that was interesting in a self-reflective kind of way. I was at a dinner party Friday night...or was it Saturday? Can you tell it was an eventful weekend? Anyway, we got on the subject of politics, and I mentioned that I was reading Beyond Chutzpah. I talked for a few minutes about the stuff I was learning about, and then realized I felt a little uncomfortable. There was this little internal editor inside of me saying "you can't talk negatively about what is going on in Israel".

I suddenly had this eerie feeling that I was sounding like a Nazi or something. From an intellectual standpoint, it made no sense whatsoever since I have no negative feelings about the Jewish people, religion, or culture. I was being critical of a foreign policy, and attempts to hide that policy...sort of how I'm always talking about the use of the topic "terror" by the current administration to cover up all of the crap they are doing (pay no attention to the man behind the curtain, look over here at the TERROR instead).

I started working my way through the internals of the feeling, and it really was rooted in some sort of cultural contract that I've learned where you don't speak "about" the Jewish people or culture in any context that could be construed as negative.

Interesting...

Devil Wear's Prada, whatever the hell that is...

OK, so I was bored.

I went to the dollar movie, and not knowing the meaning of the word Prada (never occurred to me to try www.prada.com; then again, I was standing at a kiosk trying to buy a ticket), decided to check out a movie I had heard nothing about: The Devil Wear's Prada. I frequently find that knowing nothing about a movie makes it better...you don't go in with expectations of any kind.

SIDE NOTE: I just checked prada.com...the entire site is a single image. No links. Nothing. Oh, you do get an annoying popup.

[Note: 2/7/2007. The image I had linked directly from Prada's web site changed, so no more picture :)]

The image shows what seems to be a homeless fashion model huddling beneath her hair while clinging to the bag from her last photo shoot.

I'm not traditionally a fan of "fashion", as one who knows what "Prada" is (or can read) can probably already tell. The only time I've looked at a fashion rag was in an airport when I found a copy of, I believe, "Vanity Fair" on a nearby seat. The thing was a 200-page advertisement for shiny objects.

I spent the next hour talking about it to poor, unsuspecting women in the airport. "Have you looked at one of these? What do you think?", and such. You know, the kind of thing that tends to make people edge away from me...

The best part is they were holding a writing contest where you supposed to write an essay about "What is wrong with today's Youth?"

Ugh!

Anyway, the movie is watchable, particularly since Anne Hathaway is so darn cute, and does a good job of playing a character I can identify with. The plot is a little formulaic, but not too painful.

It must have had some impact on me in any case, since as I came out of the movie I found myself wondering if I should upgrade the wardrobe.....

This, of course, led me to think about doing an experiment (I'm such a scientist at heart) where I overdress for everything, and see what kind of effect it has on how people interact with me in places like trails 10 miles from anywhere..."Nice hiking suit, buddy. Is that Armani?"

Israel

OK, so I've been oblivious to the situation in Israel forever. I decided to try to correct that during my last regular visit to the public library's New Fiction section. I checked out Finkelstein's "Beyond Chutzpah", and was yet again surprised by how much the popular press is failing us.

Furthermore, I was really saddened that there is a large amount of mis-information being put out not only by the media (a source I never consider reliable), but by scholars that one would normally hope at least had some form of integrity.

The book is a critical analysis of how the proponents of Israel use anti-semitism and the horrors of world-war II as a political tool to draw attention away from practices (such as torture, ethnic cleansing, etc.) that are politically untenable for most modern nations. It also includes mass amounts of data from reliable, independent, and
cross-referenced sources.

The really terrible thing is that scholars from institutions like Harvard are writing books that try to foster support for Israel by misleading and dishonest arguments that rely on pedigree rather than actual evidence.

Yet another reason the average American can't figure out our foreign policy in the region.

Google has spreadsheets now

OK, I've been using gmail for a long time, and have even used Gmail's interface as inspiration for my own web mail project. I recently tried out the calendars...I don't use the web interface for that (I have iCal publish to my webDAV server, and subscribe to them via google). Today, I noticed that they have an online spreadsheet system now.

I tried it out and put a budget up on it. Seems to work well. Yet another major application on the web. I have to admit it is convenient, though I sure wish Java had taken off as the language of choice for doing these things....I despise Javascript and the various browser woes it causes.

Fun with performance

OK, so I've been writing a web mail system for the University of Oregon for over a year now (http://alphamail.uoosl.org). I did a ton of analysis on performance and scalability of mail systems, since we have 40,000+ users, and supporting a web service for that many people is one of the primary problems with other solutions out there.

So, as we've migrated to this system, I knew how it should scale. I currently have 10,000 users, and the system was NOT scaling the way it was supposed to. I was a bit embarrassed because I had been stressing that my desktop system should be able to serve our user base without breaking a sweat, and now I was looking at telling them to buy a couple of quad-core machines with 16GB of RAM...can we say "uncomfortable"?

Anyway, I was motivated to do some optimizing, to say the least. I was in the midst of re-writing my email address parser, since I thought it was inefficient the way it stands, when I came across Apache::DProf. Ah, tools.

I found out that a library I'd written over a year ago (for a _much_ smaller project), which I'd imported into the project was calling internal things 10,000+ times a minute. Big indicator of a problem.

So, on closer inspection, I found that my session processing code from the old project was doing a really inefficient search to find out if a user was already logged in. This was fine when I was using it for 40-user systems, but obviously did not scale.

One code line later (skipping the check), and suddenly my scalability was where it was supposed to be!

It is funny, my recent move in research has been towards working in cross-cutting concerns and management of competing concerns in software. Here's a lovely example of where a concern assumption needed to be more explicit...somehow :)