8 - 2002 | ***Dave Does the Blog

The Irony Gods are chortling

The Johannesburg Summit on sustainable growth? Not very sustainable. 300-400 tons of trash have been generated, only 20% of which is being recycled. An estimated 5 million pieces of paper…

The Johannesburg Summit on sustainable growth? Not very sustainable.

300-400 tons of trash have been generated, only 20% of which is being recycled.
An estimated 5 million pieces of paper are being printed out or used.
The 45,000 delegates are each going through an average of 53 gallons of water a day.
Recycling bins are overflowing with nonrecyclable trash.
The travel to distant South Africa is generating about 300k tons of CO2.

The Johannesburg Climate Legacy project hopes to offset this by raising nearly $3 million from participating countries, corporations and individuals, and using it to implement 16 projects to reduce carbon emissions.

Only $300,000 has been raised, and only seven of the 192 countries at the summit have pledged donations.

Perhaps they’ve been too busy eating and drinking.

(via InstaPundit)

This is also probably meaningful

Once upon a time, RPG meetings I was in were noteworthy for three things. First, good gaming. Second, good times with friends. Third, good God, the amount of chips and…

Once upon a time, RPG meetings I was in were noteworthy for three things.

First, good gaming.

Second, good times with friends.

Third, good God, the amount of chips and beer we consumed.

Lots of Doritos. Lots of Nacho Cheese Doritos. A goodly number of regular potato chips. Dip and salsa. And, for special treats, cookies and brownies. Oh, and bowls of M&Ms.

Folks would arrive with chips, as well as a sixpack — sometimes of soda, usually of beer. And most of it would be consumed by the end of the day/evening. Lots of dead soldiers, watching over the dead orcs.

Last night, at Doyce’s Star Wars RPG …

I drank one beer. And drank ice water the rest of the night.

Everyone else drank soda, or water, or (in one case) a (shudder) Red Bull (on the rocks).

We had a yummy relatively healthful dinner up front, courtesy of Doyce (at the grill) and Jackie (at the store and propane place). And that was it. One lonely bag of chips came out, late in the game, was nibbled on sans salsa, by some of the players. The ones who weren’t on various diets, or just full.

Not a complaint, mind you, certainly not at the hospitality or the provender provided. Just sort of an interesting observation about how … well, how we’re all, er, getting, ah, more mature. That’s it. More mature.

Well I think it’s interesting.

This is probably meaningful

I got home a little after Midnight from Doyce’s D20 Star Wars game (at which much fun was, as usual, had). Margie had not really slept much since the winds…

I got home a little after Midnight from Doyce’s D20 Star Wars game (at which much fun was, as usual, had).

Margie had not really slept much since the winds had been keeping her awake.

Nonetheless, even after some long weeks and a post-Midnight sleep time, we both ended up waking up more or less spontaneously around 6:30 a.m.

For Margie, it was just sort of force of habit from waking up then fairly regularly with Kitten, concerns about the day, etc.

With me it was a continuation of pondering over D20 Silver Age Sentinals character conversion for my supers campaign.

Take that for what you will.

Comics quickie

As long as I’m touching on one geeky hobby of mine, I might as well touch on another — comics….

As long as I’m touching on one geeky hobby of mine, I might as well touch on another — comics.

Continue reading “Comics quickie”

Significant Others

Some others I know have been doing the Gaming WISH questions, and, being ever the trend-following in such things, I’m going to slowly play catch-up on them, starting with this…

Some others I know have been doing the Gaming WISH questions, and, being ever the trend-following in such things, I’m going to slowly play catch-up on them, starting with this one, No. 9. For those who don’t do RPGs, move along, nothing to see here …

Continue reading “Significant Others”

Iraq

UPDATE: Blogatelle says nice things about this post, and much of the debate continues over there in the comment section. I’ve not commented much on the impending war on Iraq….

UPDATE: Blogatelle says nice things about this post, and much of the debate continues over there in the comment section.

I’ve not commented much on the impending war on Iraq. Plenty of others have, pro and con, and there have been other, less aggravating topics for me to write about.

Well, with an intro like that, y’gotta figure what’s coming.

Continue reading “Iraq”

Travelogue

I was in custody of the Kitten today, since I have today off (woo-hoo!) and Margie has to work. To that end, I’d intentionally skipped going to the comic book…

I was in custody of the Kitten today, since I have today off (woo-hoo!) and Margie has to work. To that end, I’d intentionally skipped going to the comic book store, etc., yesterday on the way home. I wanted to have Fun with Kitten Time.

I knew the comic store didn’t open up until 10, but boming up on 9 a.m., I decided to make a run at Best Buy. “Come on, Kitten! Go car!”

Continue reading “Travelogue”

Rolling over in them

Okay, so some folks have different ideas and rules about how to make a cemetary look nice. Aesthetics are a no-win debate. But at some point, it’s a losing battle,…

Okay, so some folks have different ideas and rules about how to make a cemetary look nice. Aesthetics are a no-win debate.

But at some point, it’s a losing battle, and all you get is bad PR — just at a time when you probably don’t need any of that. As is the case where a Catholic diocese, having taken over running a local cemetary, is going around removing American flags from veterans’ gravesites.

Guys, I’m sure you mean well, but you’re just torquing folks off and coming off looking really bad. Is it worth it?

(via Blogatelle)

Cartoons

The eye and brain do something very strange with animation. This is most apparent when you see three-dimentional representations of animated figures. Some animated figures when turned into statues, or…

It's *Stanley*! The eye and brain do something very strange with animation.

This is most apparent when you see three-dimentional representations of animated figures. Some animated figures when turned into statues, or large figures at amusement parks, work just fine.

Others are just — weird. Playhouse Disney’s Stanley is one of these. I was just watching an ad for the PHD stage show and parade at Walt Disney World, and Stanley looked — very strange. His head was a very strange, unnatural shape.

Then they showed some Stanley animated clips. And, y’know … they were right. Because the animation style used in Stanley is very stylized. As a cartoon, we accept that, and translate it into beliavable representations. When faced in the flesh with actually seeing it in 3-D, though, it jars.

I wonder this is why pre-representational art, or art before the development of perspective, didn’t seem just weird and unnatural to them.

Clothes Horse, that’s me

It’s this week’s Friday Five!…

It’s this week’s Friday Five!

Continue reading “Clothes Horse, that’s me”

“Thank you …”

I’m not one to promote vandalism, even of the sticker kind, but this is awfully tempting….

I’m not one to promote vandalism, even of the sticker kind, but this is awfully tempting.

Fraternite, brother

What revolution are you? (via SFAD)…

What revolution are you?

(via SFAD)

Keeping Up with the Testermans (again)

Doyce has a great post on using AvantGo to download PDA-friendly versions of web pages to your Palm (etc.). He’s been running around with a PDA-friendly version of his page…

Doyce has a great post on using AvantGo to download PDA-friendly versions of web pages to your Palm (etc.). He’s been running around with a PDA-friendly version of his page for months, and that, plus this fine tutorial (via the now PDAable Blather) on how to do it yourself, has led me to produce this PDA-friendly version of this page (click here to autolink if you have an AvantGo account already).

Doyce has the links to a number of other sites as well. Looks like a new way to make it through those long business meetings …

All geeky goodness, all the time.

Big surprise here

As anyone knows who has actually tried to use e-mail for customer service, it’s rarely a quick way to get satisfaction. Only a third of the companies surveyed by Jupiter…

As anyone knows who has actually tried to use e-mail for customer service, it’s rarely a quick way to get satisfaction.

Only a third of the companies surveyed by Jupiter Research bothered to immediately acknowledge they had gotten customers’ e-mail in the first place, sending an automatic response.
Most of the companies did eventually respond to consumers, but don’t hold your breath; only 52 percent got back within 24 hours, while 32 percent took three days or longer.

These lackadaisical responses may come back to haunt these companies, though, since the survey showed that most “high-spending consumers” (who spend over $1000 online per year) expect a resolution to e-mail complaints within 24 hours. Since e-mail is seen as a money-saver vs. having call centers, that could ultimately increase costs for businesses.

Serves ’em right.

SoL? SoL.

State and city prosecutors, who had despaired of following up on a lot of priest molestation cases due to the Statute of Limitations, are discovering a major loophole on may…

State and city prosecutors, who had despaired of following up on a lot of priest molestation cases due to the Statute of Limitations, are discovering a major loophole on may of those statutes — the clock stops ticking if the suspect leaves the state. And since so many of these priests were quickly transferred away by their bishops …

And, judging by some comments, such end-runs around the Statute of Limitations is more than appropriate.

Mr. Burkholder said yesterday in an interview from his apartment on Oahu that his lawyer had barred him from discussing the cases in which he has been charged. Still, he ventured that there had been, on the boys’ part, “maybe a willingness, a need for affection or something, that they were looking for something.”
In an interview with The Detroit News that the newspaper published yesterday, Mr. Burkholder said his relationships with boys were “always a two-way thing.”
“The boys work in the rectory with the priest and you just get friendly. You sit down in the rectory and have a Coke. It’s a mutual deal,” he said. “An affectionate thing and a friendly thing.” He said he mostly fondled the boys, but sometimes had oral sex with them.
“It’s a friendship between two people that has been made into something horrible, rotten. People are trying by hook or by crook to make me look bad. Some of the accusations are true, but so what? I was a priest, a good priest, who had a weakness.”

‘Nuff said.

Lunch time …

Salute to the Yankee Pot RoastYou like your tv dinners normal and without the risk of being something you don’t particularly enjoy. Reliable and steadfast, and very grounded, you are…

Salute to the Yankee Pot Roast
You like your tv dinners normal and without the risk of being something you don’t particularly enjoy. Reliable and steadfast, and very grounded, you are a prime example of a general citizen- congrats!

Which TV Dinner are you?

Life imitates art

I thought these guys were supposed to be, y’know, smart? MIT’s won a $50MM grant from the DoD to design high tech gear for the US Army’s “soldier of the…

I thought these guys were supposed to be, y’know, smart?

MIT’s won a $50MM grant from the DoD to design high tech gear for the US Army’s “soldier of the future” program. Folks thought the concepts were right out of the comic books.

Well, the artwork was, at least. Uncredited. Uncompensated.

Unbelievable.

The illustration in question — a masked female soldier — appeared on page 13 of a grant proposal MIT submitted to the Pentagon to host the high-tech Institute for Soldier Nanotechnologies.
When MIT won the grant, beating out other schools such as Cornell University, national news media used the image to illustrate the kinds of futuristic warrior gear that the institute hoped to develop.
“It was an innocent use,” MIT spokesman Ken Campbell said. “We didn’t know it was from anyone else’s artwork.”

Yeah, the artwork just magically appeared in your document, and you thought it was proposal elves or something. Sheesh.

Comparative illustrations here.

(via Anadandy)

Double Bubble Bubblegum

It’s the Thursday Threesome….

It’s the Thursday Threesome.

Continue reading “Double Bubble Bubblegum”

Can’t win for losing

I mentioned the other day the quotations database I have. My biggest problem that I have with it (aside from its care and feeding) is actually publishing the damned thing….

I mentioned the other day the quotations database I have.

My biggest problem that I have with it (aside from its care and feeding) is actually publishing the damned thing. I keep it in Access, but translating from that to some nice, simple static web pages is an ongoing lesson in frustration.

First of all, you can’t. Access doesn’t want to produce static web pages. It wants to generate some sort of active web page, with scroll buttons and searching this-n-that, and acts on the assumption that you’re running on an IIS server with all sorts of other Micro$oft bells and whistles installed.

(Feel free to correct me if I’m wrong.)

Well, really, it will actually do a static page. Or a set of them, as it will take the report/query and “print” it onto multiple web pages.

I don’t want that. I want all of the quotes by authors whose last names begin with “B” to appear on the “B” page. A single page. Should be simple. ‘Tis not.

I have gotten around this for the past few years by outputting the quotations through a report that has the frelling HTML codes embedded in it, and saving that report to a text file, then massaging that file further (correcting the odd artifacts this approach adds) with all the proper formatting into an HTML file, then uploading that.

You can see why I only publish an updated version once a year or so.

I have a MySQL database on my host. I don’t know how to use it, and I’m not sure I want to go to the effort of moving my quite-functional(-except-for-the-frelling-output) Access database onto a strange, hosted platform, then learn how to present from MySQL into HTML.

It occured to me, though, a couple of days ago that Access can output to XML. And, hey, XML is this universal databasey kind of thing that I should be able to format a nice front-end to and solve my problems. This would allow me, among other things, to more frequently update the online version.

Just one catch. The frelling thing doesn’t work.

If I start with a clean database, I can export a simple table to XML. But when I do it from my WIST database, it crashes. “So sorry!” the little dialog box exclaims. “An unexpected error has crashed Access. Do you want to recover your database and send us a report about it again which will have all the effect that pressing the crosswalk button a dozen times has on making the signal change faster?”

I’ve upgraded everything to the latest release (probably my first mistake), and it just frelling doesn’t work. I’ve imported the tables into a fresh database. It works a few times, then starts crashing (stupid Micro$oft POS).

I am sure there is a better solution.

I’m just grumpily stumped as to what it is at the moment.