Tvindy

Another Eugene Weblogger Meetup

Tonight was this month's Eugene Weblogger Meetup. I've managed to attend every one since it's inception, but this is the first time I took a guest. One of my Hello Kitties accompanied me and helped to consume the non-vegetarian pizza.

I usually come away from these meetings with useful tidbits of information on blogging. This time I learned about the Wizbang Trackback Pinger, which Michael uses. It allows you to do manual trackbacks, which is extremely useful for anyone who uses TypePad, since TypePad's trackback feature nearly never works. It also lets you choose which part of your entry to include in the excerpt.

There was also a brief conversation in which we speculated on how obsessive-compulsive disorder (particularly with regard to ideas about contamination and compulsive hand washing) manifested itself in neanderthals. No conclusions were reached.

Kat was there as well. I'm glad I hadn't read her entry for today, because then I would have been afraid. She seemed to have cheered up a little since then, though. Anyway, she brought a copy of the prototype of the magazine she gets to produce for her thesis. It's called Tanuki, and you can order a copy. Since it focuses on Japanese culture, I suggested she include an article on Gloomy Bear, but I think it's too late for additions. (Someday I'm going to buy a stuffed one and perhaps even make a stained glass window in its image.) Here she is with the magazine:

Finally, Michael used his camera phone to photograph my Hello Kitty and e-mail the picture to me:

I did this already!

I did this last week, but Snowball says I have to do it again:

• If I could be a scientist, I would study the skeletal anatomy of Hello Kitty.
• If I could be a farmer, I'd work on one of those mushroom farms located in the shadows of the floating cities of Ringworld.
• If I could be a musician, I would reformulate Western music in such a way that the octave would be composed of ten (rather than eight) basic notes. Instead of sharps and flats, there would be intermediary notes called "shats".
• If I could be a doctor, I'd find a way to synthesize human pheromones and use them to great personal advantage.
• If I could be a painter, I would paint a gigantic Hello Kitty on the face of the moon that could be seen from earth and would light up during an eclipse.

Instead of tagging three people for this meme, I'll just tag Snowball three times.

More Hello Kitty

Well, it's finished . . . almost. After I left my stained glass class today, triumphantly being the first student to finish his project, I realized that I had forgotten the whiskers. They'll just be soldered on, so it shouldn't take more than a few minutes. But I'll have to wait an entire week for the next class. Here's a more detailed backlit image:

Blogging Blues

I really should write something. I seem to be going through a period of blogging burnout, which I'm sure will pass. This is the first time I have gone two consecutive days without posting (if you don't count periods of travel and/or finals). I'm also a bit behind on my reading. Bakerina recently left her blog open to guest bloggers when she went on vacation in Scotland. Not only have I not contributed an entry, as I intended, but I haven't even gotten around to catching up on what the other contributors have posted (except, of course, for this entry). Now I've heard through the grapevine that she's already back. Oh well, maybe next time.

I've recently discovered the wonders of torrents. I installed bittorrent several weeks ago in the hopes of being able to download Brazilian programming, especially novelas, but it turns out that Brazilians mostly use torrents for downloading American programs. It took me awhile before I found anything that interested me, and then I discovered I could use it for getting episodes of the new Dr. Who, which, as far as I know, are only airing in the UK. The writing is quite impressive, by the way, and, if you liked the original 26-year series, you should definitely check out Dr. number 9. (Yes, that silly attempt on Fox several years back is apparently cannon, and a complete waste of a regeneration cycle if you ask me.)

Tomorrow it's back to my stained glass Hello Kitty.

A Lame Post is Better Than No Post

I've been having a pretty hectic week with little time for blogging, but, since I didn't post yesterday, I'd better put something up today. How about a single link? Check out this article about technologically-enhanced wildlife, and be sure to look at the pictures. (from Brin)

Footwear Revisited

Way back in 2003, I posted this entry. Over the course of nearly a year, it managed to get 77 comments, making it my most commented entry ever. Unfortunately, some people just can't appreciate great art, and many of the comments are a bit negative. I finally had to close the comments down when one gentleman started insulting some of the other commenters. I was afraid some of the more negative repeat commenters would start going after more recent entries once they found themselves locked out of the one on shoes, but they never did. Anyway, I find some of the comments to be hilarious, but I've waited until now to link back to them so the bad people would have time to forget all about it. Now I ask you, how could anyone think that such shoes are gay?

Hello Kitty (part 3)

I'm sure everyone's just dying to see how my Hello Kitty stained glass window is coming along, especially since it's been two weeks since my last class. As you can see, all the pieces have been cut and ground, and I've started applying the copper foil. All along, the teacher has been trying to dissuade me from cutting holes for the eyes. She just wanted me to paint them on with solder and only worry about the nose, but the process of grinding all three head holes turned out to be fairly quick and painless. I will, however, be using solder for the whiskers.

More Meme Fun

Alicia tagged me with this particular meme (which I first saw at Bill's). I'm supposed to choose five of the hypothetical futures listed below and apply them to me.

If I could be a scientist...
If I could be a farmer...
If I could be a musician...
If I could be a doctor...
If I could be a painter...
If I could be a gardener...
If I could be a missionary...
If I could be a chef...
If I could be an architect...
If I could be a linguist...
If I could be a psychologist...
If I could be a librarian...
If I could be a lawyer...
If I could be an inn-keeper...
If I could be an athlete...
If I could be a professor...
If I could be a writer...
If I could be a llama rider...
If I could be a bonnie pirate...
If I could be an astronaut...
If I could be a world famous blogger...
If I could be a justice on any one court in the world...
If I could be married to any current famous political figure...
If I could be a dog trainer...

If I could be a librarian, I'd work at the Library of Congress, which, to me, is one of the great wonders of the modern world. I'd work in the section devoted to digitizing nearly all of the printed material still in existence and eventually making it all available online to anyone who wished to consult it. On my vacations I'd travel the globe in search of obscure ancient printed matter to be brought back, catalogued, and digitized for posterity.

If I could be an astronaut, I'd sign up to take part in the first colony on the moon or mars or whatever happens to be available. Even with the risks, I wouldn't hesitate. Unlike joining the military, taking part in and promoting an endeavor to finally get humanity into space is worth the risk of losing a few human lives in the process, even if one of them happens to be mine.

If I could be married to any current famous political figure, I suppose I'd go for the Bush twins. Of course, I'm not sure I'd be comfortable with the in-law situation. Maybe I'd be better off with Chelsea.

If I could be a world famous blogger, you can bet I'd put a bit more thought into my entries. Having a significant audience, I'd probably be much more political, so I could influence the world for the better and perhaps even get ZDTV back on the air with all of the original presenters, including Kate Botello.

If I could be a llama rider, that still doesn't mean I'd do it. All it would accomplish is to create a world full of broken-backed llamas. (I've really got to lose some weight.)

Adventures in Teaching

In teaching a class there is a critical threshold, which, once crossed, changes everything. At the beginning of a term, students start out not knowing each other or the teacher and unsure of what to expect. Then a day comes when you teach a class and encounter a completely new dynamic. It's seldom a gradual process. Suddenly the students are comfortable with each other and much more at ease and uninhibited. Although this is a positive transition, especially for a subject as interactive as a foreign language, the change is often marked by absolute time-consuming chaos. My beginning Portuguese class last week was a textbook example of this phenomenon.

As I was just starting class, a small squeak was heard in the air vent. My students were concerned. There had been a brief discussion about this in the previous class a week before, and at least two of the students were convinced that a kitten had become trapped in the air ducts. Now they were especially concerned, because the kitty had been in there for at least a week and was probably hungry (and possibly thirsty).

To me, it sounded only remotely like a cat, and I was pretty sure that, if a cat were really meowing in there, I would know it. But some of the students were absolutely convinced. One of them stood on a chair and talked to the kitty through the overhead vent cover to try and coax it closer. There was another squeak, and she believed the kitty was answering her.

I still didn't believe there was a cat, but I didn't want to chance a feline death on the off chance that my instincts were wrong. I found someone who worked in the main office, but they weren't equipped to access the air vents. We finally decided to contact Public Safety, which is sort of like the University's private police force. After a lengthy discussion on who would make the call and with what phone, one of my students placed the call on her cell phone. Simultaneously, another student went upstairs to try to find another access point. From what I could make out, the police were skeptical and even a bit rude. At one point, they even wanted to know if my student was really a student. (What relevance would that have to the issue at hand?)

Eventually the call came to an end, and the student who had gone upstairs came back down. On this particular day we had someone new watching the class, because she was considering signing up for it. I kept reassuring her that this was not a typical class. We lost about twenty minutes to the kitty. Fortunately, it was a two-hour class, so we actually did manage to get a lot done. Strangely, the police never did show up. Perhaps they were busy with other things.

Despite continued squeaks, by the end of the class the students seemed far less certain of their kitty conviction. If you're reading this with concern over the possibility of the kitty being real, let me reassure you that I am 99.999% certain that there was never a kitty.

Yet Another Filler Pic