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Below are the 20 most recent journal entries recorded in
Plaid's LiveJournal:
- 01:39 50% connectivity established in the new office. Kludged together internet access. #
- 03:05 @MrsXinu I'm not a big fan of the Q. It's kinda clunky, and older models are unreliable. #
| Saturday, May 17th, 2008 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 10:05 pm | Twit this! | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 5:20 pm | The tear down went well, and the rebuild is going much easier than expected, Alex and James really know their stuff. I'll have to spread the kudos around to management about these guys. They're good at what they do. The network connectivity is going as smooth as glass, too. The private line was already up, so when I connected our equipment and tested, connectivity was already established. The internet line is supposed to be up, but until we get our DNS server and proxy server online, I'm not going to bother testing it. 5:22pm local time. Looking good about getting out of here at a reasonable hour tonight. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Thursday, May 15th, 2008 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 4:08 pm | OK folks. I've setup a Twitter, as recommended by a friend, to help feel a little more connected while I'm in the HK. I'm plaidomatic on there, as well. http://www.twitter.com/plaidomatic | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 12:00 pm | I miss my family, a lot. Does anybody have any tips for dealing with homesickness and all that, when you're halfway across the world? I'm trying to keep busy with work, but there's just not much to do, right now. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Wednesday, May 14th, 2008 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 10:28 pm | so far, the trip isn't exactly going well. The flight wasn't a 747-400. Since it wasn't highly occupied, they changed it to an Airbus A340-300, which is rather smaller, and just has regular regional economy seating. Which seriously SUCK on a 14 hour flight. I arrived here, and spent an hour getting through customs. Which is fairly typical for just about anybody I think. As usual, the taxi to the hotel was an entertaining jaunt. Just close your eyes and think of christmas. The hotel though... is a pit. It's in a local asspit of a neighborhood, the AC is non-functional so it's about 90 degrees in here. The mattress appears to be a cardboard box. The restaurant and the pool are both "indefinitely" closed, although from the looks of it I think they mean "until the hotel goes out of business." I think I'll move up the street to a better place tomorrow. This place was supposed to be three stars, which I would typically do OK with for business. But apparently, they pass out the stars like candy, because daaaaaamn. And I'm lonely. Why is it I always forget how homesick and lonely I get on these trips? Ugh. I want my Kimie and my kids. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Tuesday, May 13th, 2008 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 12:28 pm | Hong Kong or Bust A quick and uneventful flight to Vancouver BC, and a 3.5 hour stopover, before getting on a giant 747-400, for eventually touch down in Hong Kong at 8pm HKT. Which is something like 3am tomorrow morning, my regular time. Oh my god, the jet lag is going to suck. I'm still fairly freaked out about the whole halfway-around-the-world thing, not to mention the proverbial "stranger in a strange land" thing. I picked up the first two books of the Dresden Files, since I haven't read them, but I've heard good things. Also, I got a modest collection of Lovecraft stories. Something to help me sleep better at night... ;) I think I'm going to go check in and get my boarding pass, then, I dunno, find a place to get some electrons into my laptop and maybe watch a movie or read some more. Current Mood:  pensive | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Wednesday, May 7th, 2008 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 11:34 pm | Kim was taking a while upstairs to tuck Casey in. About an hour longer than usual in fact.  No, I didn't disturb them. This was pretty much shot in the dark. Thank goodness for good cameras, right? | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Saturday, May 3rd, 2008 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 3:28 pm | I bop, you bop, she bop
Clearly, I'm not as big a slut as I'd like to be. Going to have to work on that... Current Mood:  hornyCurrent Music: Peter Gabriel - Kiss That Frog | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Monday, April 21st, 2008 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 10:12 am | I just discovered while finishing up my morning Dew that if I'm looking up when I swallow, it goes up my nose. That can't be right. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Tuesday, April 15th, 2008 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 9:55 pm | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Monday, April 14th, 2008 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 11:56 pm | In the real world, there are many legitimate reasons that someone may want to remain anonymous, while still being able to publish or find information. In the real world, there are countless legitimate many reasons that you may want to prevent someone from overhearing or watching what you do. These concepts, anonymity and privacy, are key elements in American society. Privacy can be seen to be a sort of default state, in fact. We're assumed to be entitled to default state of privacy by our legal system. (Yes, ha ha, however, this isn't an overt discussion of politics. We'll do that one some other time.) Something that people think less about is that we're entitled to a surprising amount of anonymity, too. We're legally entitled to anonymous speech, writing, and can anonymous buy and sell most things. A vast amount of money and effort has been spent over the decades since the inception of the computer age, attempting to meet the privacy needs of storage and communication. This conversation isn't going to cover privacy. That's another topic for yet another time. ( Our topic today is anonymity, with a pinch of stupidity. ) What's surprising to me is that IRC network EFNet, the world leader in carefully controlled anarchy by fiat, K-lines and blacklists users that are found running a Tor exit node. EFNet is by some accounts, a "wretched hive of scum and villainy." EFNet prides itself on the freedom of its users, the overall lack of rules and restrictions. They go so far as to shun software tools used to protect an IRC channels against hostile takeovers, so that channel operators must maintain control via sheer numbers and hope for voluntarily equitable democracy. And yet, they do not permit Tor exit nodes to contact the network. I assume this is done to prevent people from skirting IP-based bans. However, this isn't exactly effective. When my home network was banned for running a Tor node, I simply could've reattached by using one of nearly a dozen shell or virtual network accounts I have other places. And I'm one of the GOOD guys. A dedicated troll isn't going to be persuaded to stop by a K-line, much less the ill humor of a handful of network operators. Perhaps more stunningly out of place, their chosen blacklist operator clearly misunderstands what Tor is all about, and misconstrues what control Tor node operators have. Ah, irony. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Wednesday, April 2nd, 2008 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 10:08 am | Well holy shit. You could knock me over with a feather. http://video.msn.com/video.aspx?mkt=e This elephant is displaying self-awareness, cognition, creative impulse, and this just blows my mind. It's possible that the elephant has been painstakinly trained through more traditional means to draw in a particular way, but I think this needs study. Are elephants capable of sentience? | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Friday, March 21st, 2008 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 8:26 pm | I may not think to post later, but just to raise a middle finger to the inanity of the strike: Hi. This is a post. To raise the other finger, I may post some real content later. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Friday, March 7th, 2008 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 2:27 pm | I haven't posted about it yet. This is probably symptomatic of my "not posting about anything" issue, than anything, though. ( Read more... ) | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Monday, March 3rd, 2008 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 9:13 am | Happy birthday to my baby, ![[info]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small} kimie! I love you so much, baby! | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Friday, February 29th, 2008 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 1:10 pm | Yeah, you know some days you just want to fuck the world with a rake. Current Mood:  frustratedCurrent Music: The Feeling - Helicopter | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Tuesday, February 26th, 2008 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 4:46 pm | Dine for Darfur I wanted to tell you about a local event happening next Tuesday in Seattle and Portland to help raise money for the work Mercy Corps is doing in Darfur. http://DineForDarfur.org/ | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 9:42 am | Oh SNAP! High winds, plus failed brakes = great fun | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Monday, February 25th, 2008 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 4:51 pm | Washington state legislature is attempting to pass a really stupid bill... One that would add hundreds of dollars to the registration fees of many, if not most, of the cars on the road in Washington. If you live in Washington, you really need to read this. ( Read more... ) | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 2:31 pm | Kim and I have been talking for a while about trading one of our cars in on something less expensive and more fuel efficient. We don't really need two SUVs. But we do need ONE, for when we take the whole family on longer drives, so we pretty much agreed we'd trade Kim's Montero Sport in on something smaller, and hang onto the larger Montero Limited. With the aftermath of my unemployment still looming in our bank accounts, and the new ungodly gas bills we're seeing with my up-to-4-hour commute, we decided now would be the time. I wanted a hybrid, so that we could see the best possible benefit from a new(er) car. I'd been looking around for a while, but not having much luck in getting the numbers to work out in our favor. Until I found a really good deal on a used Prius. We did what we'd talked about, we traded Kim's Montero Sport in on the Prius. I won't get into the details of the finances, but they worked out pretty well in our favor. Combined with the expected savings in fuel, the monthly savings are not just significant. They're huge. On the matter of the Prius itself... it's a cute white '05 Prius, in really great shape, everything honestly looks brand new. No scratches, no dings, no stains in the interior. It's surprisingly roomy inside, and much to my dismay (I'm a huge Honda fan), it's a lot quieter than the Civic Hybrid. Better mileage, too. As for the mileage? On this tank of gas so far (1/8th of a tank burned) the car is averaging 42mpg. However, most of that is a lot of short hops. On my drive into work today, I averaged about 51mpg. On a short hop over to Burger King to grab lunch, I got over 70mpg! (Thanks to careful driving and a mostly-warm engine, it pretty much ran on just battery for most of the drive.) | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
