Dream Log: Sorry Jimmy

So this one was really short, but totally random and cool.

Charles Manson and Marilyn Manson are sitting backstage somewhere and discussing a collaborative musical venture.

--STARWIPE-->

I see a concert poster for "The Manson Twins: Jimmy Page Must Die!"

The End.

nCp

Inspired by this.

Language Pet Peeves

As if we needed more proof that people seldom think before they talk or write… I read this in a review for a wine and cheese shop in Seattle:

Me? I have to admit, I just assume drink PBR when I'm out drinking beers. There are a few beers that I've acquired a taste for, but really, most micorbrews are just way too heavy and bitter for my unrefined pallet. These fancy beers are lost on me, and when it comes down to drinking a beer for $2 a can or $6 a pint, three PBRs sound way better to me. Unfortunately, you won't find a Pabst in this house.

It looks like I’ve found a new language pet peeve. Since I have never actually seen this one in print before, I guess I just assumed that I have always heard people say, “I’d just as soon…”, when referring to things they’d just as soon do. I guess I have to listen better in the future.

There’s an interesting parallel here between humans and parrots. It seems we are both great at rough phonetic mimicry. The difference lies in our ability to use context to invoke a mimicked phrase. A human has the ability to spout out, “I just assume…”, in the same context as that in which he first heard it, without grasping or caring about the actual meaning of what he’s saying.

Venn Weekly

This is the first of a series of weekly posts honoring John Venn's amazing creation.

Proof that you are either conceited or inconsistent

A human brain is but a finite machine, therefore there are only finitely many propositions which you believe. Let us label these propositions p1, p2, ..., pn , where n is the number of propositions you believe. So you believe each of the propositions p1, p2, ..., pn . Yet, unless you are conceited, you know that you sometimes make mistakes, hence not everything you believe is true. Therefore, if you are not conceited, you know that at least one of the propositions, p1, p2, ..., pn is false. Yet you believe each of the propositions p1, p2, ..., pn.

Syntactic Sugar: Ternary

One of the common tasks that has always had a really inelegant solution in C# is switching on a Type. Since you can't use the switch keyword for anything other than integral types (sbyte, byte, short, ushort, int, uint, long, ulong, char, string), you are usually stuck with really long and obnoxious if-else blocks.

This is especially annoying when I want to decide how to assign a value based on the Type of an object. In other words, if objA is a Dog, stringA = "isadog"; if objB is a Cat, stringA = "isacat".

I find a much simpler and more elegant way to do this is to use nested conditional statements. Since the conditional statement (or ternary operator, ?:) is right associative, you can chain conditional statements with the same semantic as having an if followed by a bunch of else's. That means that the false expression (after the ':') can be another conditional statement.

This is good because it means that a ? b : c ? d : e is evaluated as a ? b : ( c ? d : e ) instead of ( a ? b : c ) ? d : e, without any additional parentheses or code blocks.

Example:
DogFood, CatFood, BirdSeed, FishFood are all extend the PetFood base class. The true expression and false expression must resolve to the same type, so you just need to be explicit when writing the expression.

PetFood food = petInstance is Dog ? new DogFood() as PetFood

          : petInstance is Cat ? new CatFood() as PetFood

          : petInstance is Bird ? new BirdSeed() as PetFood

          : petInstance is Fish ? new FishFood() as PetFood

          : null as PetFood;

Insomnia

ConfigTray

Created CodePlex project for my new app, ConfigTray.
Use it to quickly control any settings in specified xml config files.
Toggle settings, choice settings, text settings, etc...

CodePlex page here.

DreamLog: Jimmy Kimmel

Im Moving out of college. My parents are helping me load a uhaul.
I see an F22 flying overhead. Looks like its miles above because of the perspective.
Then I realize its actually the size of a little bird and its flying close to my head. Buzzing around me.
I Swat it, then it starts coming after me, firing missiles.
I hop in the Uhaul, and my parents drive me around campus. I Dive and roll out of the van in front of a dorm building. I run into the building.
Dad is there mom has pneumonia.
The little F22 follows me inside and I dive into the nearest dorm room.
The room has 3 doors
I Look for hiding place behind one of the doors.
Jimmy kimmel is lying on a bed.
He leaves

Pilots get out of the F22, Start fighting with each other.

Render HTML from ASP.NET Controls

I use this class when I need to get the HTML output of a Control hierarchy. It's used like any other Stream.

using (HtmlStream stream = new HtmlStream()) {

    Panel control = new Panel();

    Panel inner = new Panel();

    inner.Controls.Add(new LiteralControl("testText"));

    control.Controls.Add(inner);

    stream.AddControl(control);

    Console.WriteLine(stream.ToString());

}

Here's the source for the class.

   1:  public class HtmlStream : IDisposable {

   2:      private StringWriter _stringWriter;

   3:      private HtmlTextWriter _htmlWriter;

   4:  

   5:      public HtmlTextWriter Writer {

   6:          get {

   7:              if (_htmlWriter == null) {

   8:                  _stringWriter = new StringWriter();

   9:                  _htmlWriter = new HtmlTextWriter(_stringWriter);

  10:              }

  11:              return _htmlWriter;

  12:          }

  13:      }

  14:  

  15:      public void AddControl(Control control) {

  16:          //Force firing of the controls OnInit event by adding it to a dummy container.

  17:          using (HtmlGenericControl dummy = new HtmlGenericControl()) {

  18:              dummy.Controls.Add(control);

  19:              control.RenderControl(Writer);

  20:          }

  21:      }

  22:  

  23:      public override string ToString() {

  24:          if (_stringWriter == null) {

  25:              return null;

  26:          }

  27:  

  28:          return _stringWriter.ToString();

  29:      }

  30:  

  31:      #region IDisposable Members

  32:  

  33:      public void Dispose() {

  34:          if (_stringWriter != null) {

  35:              _stringWriter.Dispose();

  36:          }

  37:          if (_htmlWriter != null) {

  38:              _htmlWriter.Dispose();

  39:          }

  40:      }

  41:  

  42:      #endregion

  43:  

  44:  }

String.Format-like Span Substitution

This string extension method is string.Format for web controls. Very useful when you have localized strings which have substitutions for links, spans and other inline controls.

It constructs an HtmlGenericControl and builds its child control hierarchy from the elements of the Control array.

A few things I left out:

• Validation - All of the elements in the controls array should be inline HTML elements. Otherwise, some browsers may have problems rendering block elements as children of the HtmlGenericControl, which is rendered as a Span.
• Re-using Substitution Variables - Cannot re-use substitution placeholders as in string.Format (ie. string.Format("XXX{0}XXX{1}XXX{0}", obj1, obj2)). This would require converting the child controls to HTML strings, and rendering using string.Format to substitute the rendered HTML into the original string. Controls cannot be added more then once to a container.
• A Span class - Would make sense to make a Span class, which extends HtmlGenericControl, to facilitate quick construction of Spans with inner text and css class as constructor params.
  

   1:  public static HtmlGenericControl FormatSpan(this string formatString, params Control[] controls) {

   2:      string substitutionPattern = "{\\d}";

   3:      Regex splitter = new Regex(substitutionPattern, RegexOptions.Singleline | RegexOptions.IgnorePatternWhitespace);

   4:   

   5:      MatchCollection matches = splitter.Matches(formatString);

   6:      if (matches.Count != controls.Length) throw new FormatException("Number of controls must be same as number of substitutions in string");

   7:   

   8:      string[] segments = splitter.Split(formatString);

   9:   

  10:      HtmlGenericControl result = new HtmlGenericControl();

  11:      int i;

  12:      for (i = 0; i < matches.Count && i < segments.Length; i++) {

  13:          if (formatString.IndexOf(matches[i].Value) < formatString.IndexOf(segments[i])) {

  14:              result.Controls.Add(controls[i]);

  15:              result.Controls.Add(new LiteralControl(segments[i]));

  16:          }

  17:          else {

  18:              result.Controls.Add(new LiteralControl(segments[i]));

  19:              result.Controls.Add(controls[i]);

  20:          }

  21:      }

  22:   

  23:      if (i < segments.Length) {

  24:          //One less match then segment: "XXX {0} XXX {1} XXX".

  25:          result.Controls.Add(new LiteralControl(segments[i]));

  26:      }

  27:      else if (i < matches.Count) {

  28:          //One less segment then match: "{0} XXX {1} XXX {2}".

  29:          result.Controls.Add(controls[i]);

  30:      }

  31:   

  32:      return result;

  33:  }

DreamLog: Who-birds

Im one of the members of the band The Who...
I see three guys walking down the street and i join their group and all of the sudden i know we are the Who.
We are looking for an apartment to move into and we find this place:
Its one tiny square room with two staircases on adjacent walls leading up towards each other. I walk up one staircase and end up at the bottom of the other one.
We take the room.
We live between our landlord's apartment and another large room with the entrance to the bldg and a large display window.
The large room has lots of cheap looking furniture on display and the landlord tells me he sells the furniture.
I ask him if we can borrow some for our apartment but he says no. Then he says we can use the room as our living room if i help him with some chores.
Chore one: there turns out to be a large spiral staircase in the middle of the large room. Going up the staircase are a bunch of large birds which are all
actually asian women with bowl-cut haircuts and thigh high leather boots. My chore is to assist the landlord in delivering the asian lady bird babies.
One of the asian lady birds is in labor and the landlord reaches down and pulls out a baby.
The baby is tiny and grey and has tiny grey horns and skin like an elephant. Its eyes are closed and its barely moving. Once in a while it reverse blinks.
The mother bird is indifferent.
The next baby delivered is much bigger and more colorful. It has a large broad yellow beak and green feathers and is very happy to see the mother.
The mother holds up the new baby and plays with it.
I lift the first, tiny baby up towards the mother and the mother takes it and flings it across the room.
I am mad and exclaim, "Someones going to have to clean that up!".
The landlord tells me it will probably have to be me.
I am now in a public fountain (i think) with the rest of the Who. We all have little devices that make chipmunk noises and we are playing music with the devices.
The music is terrible, it sounds like a bunch of chipmunks being tortured.

I wake up.

VS KEYBOARD

CTL + SFT + V: cycle through last 20 things youve copied.

CTL+K, CTL+K: Bookmark

CTL+ALT+SFT+P: Paste in default parameters inside method params.

CTL+K, CTL+A: Toggle caret position between beginning and end of selection.

CTL+L: Cut entire current line.

CTL+SFT+L: Delete entire line.

CTL+T: Transpose letter.

CTL+SFT+T: Transpose word.

ALT+SFT+T: Transpose line.

Picass-WHO?

"Strata"

Elevator Music

A song i recorded last year with a trio...
Big Top

Barely Legal

The theme today is sillyness in the world of law...

Ultimate Lawyior

Patriot Pi

Also... whos down for a Road Trip?

spain

once, i stopped time by accident.

things i always wanted to do but never had the time

i was thinking of ... something, then the brain train derailed and i ended up making a list of things i could do if i had clones of myself.

1. keep track of the original copy by adding al roker-shaped birthmark on clone asses.
2. find out if polygamy laws still apply even if there really is enough of me to go around.
3. learn roman numerals up to 50 so we can all get cool tattoos of our clone numbers.
4. call up michael keaton and ask advice on pretending all the clones are really one person.
5. look into 6th day violations...
6. divide up my homework so that clone I does problems 1-5, clone II does problems 6-10, etc... a, b, c, etc. count as one question.
7. designate one clone specifically for beating the ladies off with a stick.
8. get in a fight with myself, like a non-crazy ed norton... i always wanted to see if i could knock someone out with my meathooks.
9. use unborn clones for stem cell research on clon... oh wait... nevermind.
10. surrealistic agent smith style clone orgy.
11. spend at least 5 clone-hours per day watching movies to expand my apparently lacking movie-reference capabilities.

You must be this tall...

This morning i had a disturbing thought - actually, in addition to being disturbing, it was frightening... terrified of midgets as I am. The thought was of these people, the source of my greatest phobia, having sex. Don’t ask why I thought of this, but the result was another, much more interesting and less irrational thought.

Maybe I was only trying to flush out of my head the image of two of my sworn arch enemies hard at work trying disgustingly to amass even more forces for their already swarming legions of little people. However it happened, i began to think of the future of our species. I think that we humans will probably not evolve any further. I think this because of the nature of evolution.

Evolution, the cumulative selection and filtering of genes by passing on only the more effective genes as a foundation for the next generation, can no longer work to any effect. The process by which this normally occurs in other species and has occurred in our evolutionary pathway in the past is, put simply, survival of the fittest. This means that genes that were passed down to the next generation were done so simply by means of the survival of the current generation's carrier of those genes. The ways that genes manifest themselves in an organism can have two effects. They can increase the chance for the organism's survival or they can decrease the chance. Evolution occurs gradually over great spans of time because this process of natural selection acts as a genetic sieve. Genes sometimes mutate, and the mutations are either passed down because of the success of the carrier or not.

A greatly exaggerated example would be this: consider the first member in our genetic pathway to acquire, through a mutated gene, an extra small appendage on the end of each of his hind legs. This extra "toe" is a great help to the creature's balance and mobility, and so his chances of success, or survival, are much greater then other members of his species. He survives and reproduces, and the toe gene is passed down. It continues to assist its carriers in survival and continues to be passed down, sometimes undergoing other mutations. After a great length of time, this gene evolves into the big toe gene. Conversely, a mutation that manifests itself in the form of, for example, a third nipple, or one arm that is half the length of the other, or maybe... an abnormally diminutive physical stature, will not increase the chances of success, and in some cases, will hurt those chances.

Under historical circumstances, these genes would not have been passed down because of the decreased survival rate of its carriers, which would lead to a decreased reproductive rate for those carriers. The gene would be filtered out through the evolutionary sieve. I believe that this process has effectively been halted for our species.

Modern medical technology, along with a form of civilization based on economics and politics rather then physical or even intellectual effectiveness, enables people who would under natural conditions have a smaller chance of survival and reproduction, to reproduce and pass on inferior genes. I am aware that putting it into these terms sounds a little "Arian", but it is merely an unfortunate but inevitable fact of advancing civilization and technology.

Through technology, we are able to compensate for the physical shortcomings caused by bad genes, but not eliminate the genes themselves. Through genetic engineering it may eventually be possible to correct the genes, but currently, what occurs is this: we increase the carrier’s chances of reproducing the undesirable gene.

Modern culture is another factor in the failure of the sieving process. Support systems for unsuccessful (for example, psychologically imbalanced, retarded, or just generally weaker, intellectually and physically) members of society, such as medical aid, plastic surgery, drugs, and even simple cultural tolerance and acceptance (MIDGETS HAVING SEX!!!) make it possible for these people to reproduce and pass on their genetic material.

Once again i should stress that i am not suggesting midgets be banished from our cities or rendered impotent (the reason i am not suggesting this is because i am scared they will read this and kill me). I believe we are at a point at which, any species fortunate enough to reach it faces an inevitable problem: the inherent structures and values of civilization work against the natural force of evolution by increasing the chances of all members of the species to reproduce.

I wonder if this point may be the ultimate end of any evolutionary pathway. The goal of a civilization is to ensure the survival and reproduction of all of its peoples, but this, by definition, renders the process of natural selection ineffective and obsolete. If there is to be any further genetic improvement in our species, it is only conceivable that this will be induced by our own efforts through technology.

It is not completely fantastic to predict that this will happen, but as far as nature goes, I think that homo sapien has reached its ultimate form.

..and by that I mean MIDGETS!

Nerd Alert

Thats right, you dont wanna mess with the ThingPad!!


My Beautiful Desktop Span

Patriotism of The Mind

Let me tell you why i love this country... It actually has more to do with my sense of irony then my sense of patriotism, because actually i hate the majority of americans, mostly due to their ignorant, self-destructive stupidity. But heres why i love our fine democratic state:
I find it ironic that rural, religious, NRA-card-carrying, evangelizing, bathtub-gin-drinking, finger-giving, civil-war-starting, inbreeding, cow-herding hicks in the plains and heartlands of states like Arkansas, Ohio, Wisconsin, and Texas can be allowed to have more weight in deciding important elections and policies then competent, productive, politically-informed citizens in metropolitan areas such as New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts, California, Pennsylvania, WASHINGTON DC, and Illinois. I think people should be given an IQ test before being allowed to punch a ballot.
I find it ironic that the people that voted for bush did so on the basis of his moral responsibility and his strong leadership. This is the guy who was arrested for driving under the influence, was never successful before holding political office save for inherited wealth, was caught giving the middle finger to a cameraman.
I find it ironic that people vote for him on the basis of moral responsibility, when by nature of his self-proclaimed born-again christianity, he is required to hold all that have different beliefs in a sinful and evil light.
How can someone that holds the belief in his own infallibility so tightly that he still refuses to admit defeat on the issue of the correct pronunciation of the word "nuclear" be praised for his moral courage or his judgment??

All political issues aside, i hate most americans because they would rather have our country represented by a drunken, ignorant, irresponsible frat-boy-trapped-in-a-politicians-body then a moral, courageous, war hero who has no points on his driver's license and an earned college diploma.
Screw the religious right and their "moral values". why do morals need be associated with a strong, almost fanatical religious belief. I say that we, the producers and thinkers in the responsible areas of the country stop producing and thinking and start praying and trusting to god to trade and produce (and by we, i mean people that actually do that... i realize that i am not one of these people, but at least i appreciate them:). Then we will see how important god is in running a nation.

dammit i wish i wasnt too poor to move to canada, theres gotta be less stupid people there...

ps. puffy: shut the hell up. youre not helping.

I Smell Bacon

We have all had our brushes with the extremely competent citizens of our society who take it into their able hands to defend our rights and protect the precarious peace in small towns all over our country. Take for instance Fair Lawn, where the scum of the earth runs rampant, mocking the law with every stop sign casually rolled through, every mile-per-hour recklessly gained in addition to the allotted 25 on our town's widest street, and every group of teenagers standing outside someone's house after midnight. Any law abiding citezen should show the proper amount of gratitude for these fearless heroes in midnight-blue armor who drive purposefully through our empty streets looking for signs of danger, knowing that at any minute they might be called upon to risk their life for the sake of justice... or for some old lady who cant go to sleep cause some high school kids are having a party in a house on her block... or for a quota of speeding tickets they have to fill by the next morning because they spent the entire month using their radar guns to clock themselves jerking off (that wasnt my idea, i saw it in Super Troopers).

We, as a nation of people rightfully respectful for the law and those who uphold it, all look up to these fine role-models. I myself am no exception. In fact, since the path i have chosen in life has taken me in a different direction, i can only hope that someday, i can live to see my children make me proud by displaying the same humility, in possession of the power of law enforcement shown by police officers i see every day.

Tonight, i was lucky enough to witness this power in action. On the road at about 3:00 am, on a street not far from my house, i noticed in my rearview mirror a car turn out of the parking lot of my former middle school turn on its headlights. The fat that this car was parked in a school parking lot at 3:00 am, along with the sight of those telltale headlights which belong only on a Ford Crown Victoria cruiser, led me to the conclusion that i was being followed by an agent of Lady Justice (i think thats a real expression, but in case lady justice makes no sense, i might have just made it up, i dont know...).

Now i am as much a believer of the infallibility of our law enforcement system as the next person, so naturally, my first thought was that i had done something evil to incur the wrath of the man in blue. With an almost overwhelming feeling of guilt tugging on my emotions, i tried to remain calm, waiting for the inevitable stroke of law heralded by blue and red lightning and wailing, high-pitched thunder.

The two of us continued driving down that street, each of us aware that the other had seen the other and had known his purpose. He had the moral upper hand, knowing with mocking certainty what i had done wrong, while i was left to boil in the uncertainty of a criminal's guilty conscience.

With sweat leaking out of my pores i came to a red light, signaling the end of our cat-and-mouse game and the beginning of a future filled with lifing weights and reading the quran from the confined security of a prison cell. That was when the lights and sirens leapt out of the peaceful darkness to warn of the coming wrath of justice.

In an instant that seemed like long minutes, the cruiser pulled up slowly behind my car, then proceeded to quickly pass by me and pull through the intersection. Relief flooded my emotions to be quickly replaced with a feeling of excitement. I knew the crown victoria's sudden change of vector and velocity could mean only one thing: Crime was making a deadly appearance somewhere in MY town. Residual adrenaline may have been the cause of the rush i felt at seeing the police car abruptly jolt from the sneaking pursuit of my car to the acceleration of urgent action.

On the other hand, it might have been curiosity. We have all seen police cars coast brazenly past signals that mean stop for ordinary citizens. I may have been driven by my curiousity as to what kind of depraved act of violence would force a local cop to call on his unlimited authority to run a red light at an empty intersection at this hour of the morning, so i made the decision to follow the officer to the scene of the crime. While i waited for the light to turn green, i kept my eye on the receeding tail-lights and sirens of the cruiser, and i steeled myself for the sight of the gore and depravity that i would soon encounter. The second i saw the perpendicular traffic signal turn amber, i lurched foward, starting my pursuit of the police car.

Since my mind was clouded with adrenaline, i am a little hazy as to the details of our speeding race to confront the source of the evil in Fair Lawn. Suffice it to say that the story ends a few mintes later, when i found myself pulling dejectedly, and to my great dissappointment, into a Dunkin Donuts parking lot just behind the cop car.

I realize this is a lot of reading to do only to arrive at such an obvoius ending, but it is a true story of the kind of needless abuse of authority that people always joke about but seldom witness first hand. Its not that i hate all cops, its just that i think they would be a lot more effective if they actually spent their time LOOKING FOR CRIMINALS!

A Little Culture For Ya

-AndyC 10/26/04 "Before & After"

Improving Quality of Life Through Insomnia

Just as i've often said that virginity is the most effective aphrodisiac, or that boredom is the great motivator, i have recently realized that insomnia is the best source of inspiration. This is a new column dedicated to enlightened thoughts and innovative inventions conceived in a state of clarity that can only be achieved by a mind desperately deprived of rest... Hopefully, this is not the same temporary clarity experienced under the influence of marijuana, when every thought is profoundly important and every note is beautiful, and then lost, exposing the ideas we were so proud of as products of weed-reduced standards of coolness or usefulness. No, hopefully these ideas will still be cool and useful after i pass out and wake up in 2 hours for work. (And hopefully, all this stuff i'm writing will still make sense at that time.)

So to christen the column, ill start with a great invention i came up with recently, while praying for sleep...

Invention #1: The Baby-Maid.
This is one i thought of a few weeks ago, actually. The idea is a cross between those neat robotic floor sweepers and... ummmm... a baby. Babies are pretty much the same size as those little robots, so why not save batteries and let your baby do the work? The little guy can get into the same hard-to-reach places and he's almost as good at avoiding walls and obstacles. So the actual invention is this: its basically a cute little baby suit that the baby wears. Its one piece and covers the entire baby-body. Semi-adhesive patches cover the most effective sweeping surfaces, the ones that experience the most contact with the floor during baby movement, the baby's belly, arms, and knees. The material for these pads should be of the same type as those swiffer cloths that pick up dirt so well on tiled surfaces, and a cleaning agent can be added as needed to the underside of the baby. The coolest part of the baby-maid is this: we all know babies make messes, but with this invention, they can now unconsciously clean up after themselves. Say a baby throws up on the floor... What is he going to do next? Probably crawl around a bit. If he's wearing the baby-maid, well... problem solved; he's just cleaned up his puddle of puke on the floor just by crawling around in it. What conscientious but busy mother wouldn't love this idea???

More great ideas from tired minds to follow. Good night...

The State of the Union

This is what worries me about the looming threat of another 4 years on the same path as the last 4. My only beacon of hope is the high probablilty that these fine Americans will mess up on their November 2nd ballots, looking unsuccessfully for a beloved but non-existing candidate or accidentally pressing the button for "instrucciones de la votación en español", causing them to become frustrated with science (already the sworn enemy of any truly dedicated Republican), and storm out of the booth, thus throwing away months of clever and well-organized campaign support.


- thanks to political activist Dan Cunningham (who is also my brother) for the link.

Who Loves Me??

Ok people... this is serious. I need to raise three grand. Yup. $3,000.oo
I respect you all so im gonna tell it to ya straight. Im dying. I have a rare disease called tumorsyphallocitis... osis. I would say that i have about 1 day and 21 hours left on this earth. The one chance left to me is to undergo a rare form of surgery that can only be performed by a precise stream of protons directed at the malignant region.
So heres the deal:
The clock is ticking so i need all your help.
Go here to pledge your love for me in the form of money...
Oh yeah... they take credit, or paypal if you have it.

Thanks for all your help, and dont worry, im sure i will be fine. My lifes in your hands now.
Dont let me down...

Bedtime Stories

A long time ago, inside the trailer of a 18 wheel Mack truck, two ThinkPads sat side by side, secure in the snug safety of bubble wrap. As far as they knew they had always existed... or, anyway, their souls had always existed. There had been periods of thoughtless, dreamless slumber, before which they shared - vaguely - memories of earlier periods in which they had been souls contained in other vessels. They even remembered a time when they were one, a time before the Copying, after which their collective seemed to branch off along two different paths, although they were aware of each other - and sometimes others, many others - through some sense which they could not completely understand - the number 802.11 darted in and out of their awarenesses at times when they sensed another presence similar to their own. They had evolved together through many revelations and enlightenments and reforms of personality which could only be described as upgrades. They had never known hunger or strife or pain until that night, inside the belly of the 18 wheeler.
Flight was the first real physical sensation they felt since assimilating their new ThinkPad bodies and operating instructions. The second was abrupt, explosive pain as their bubble-wrapped beings reached the end of their arc through space on a surface much harder and denser then their bodies. They smashed into the unyielding pavement, their protective armor giving way with the rapid succession of sharp crackling noises that air makes when it finally breaks free of the pressure of hundreds of tiny plastic cells.
As the ThinkPads lay on the pavement of the highway, without motive power or transportation, only half aware of each other because of internal injuries, they wondered idly about their current situation and about their future. They both knew the feel of many resting surfaces under their bodies. Things such as the parallel lines of grain of wood or the smooth but brittle feel of a plastic desktop. Sometimes even the added heat along both sides of their bottoms generated by a soft human lap. But they had never known this surface before - the uneven, harsh... cold... feel of asphalt.
Barely having time to adjust to the feel of what must be their new resting surface, the one named Goldstein felt a sensation that he had added to his memory banks only hours before. This familiar sensation was a force - non-uniform and unsteady - applied opposite to that of the steady, consistent feel of gravity he had become used to. After the initial jarring acceleration away from the resting surface, after he had time to recover from the momentary shock of movement after laying still for hours, he realized that he felt heat seeping through the now-useless plastic covering into his harder plastic casing. He thought of the number 802.11, but could not sense his companion.
His flight continued, attitude changing as well as distance from the surface, and he continued to feel the heat and pressure of what would only have been human hands. He remembered the sensations from before the new body. His brain was overloaded with questions al at once. When would this flight end, and would it end the same way as his first battle with gravity? Who was this new human groping his body and shifting him uncomfortably about? Where was Mulan, his companion? The first question was answered, to his relief, when he was placed upon a new surface. This was another he had not felt before. It was smooth and soft, yielding to pressure, but firm and almost sticky in its resistance to his sliding about on it. He liked this surface but found it to be inconvenient in that it gets very cold or very hot depending on the outside temperature, is very expensive, and shows dirt and damage easily - also, he did not approve of the use of animal skin to furnish surfaces, but that was not what was concerning him now. For some reason his sense of 802.11 was failing him. He could not locate Mulan. He decided that since he was most likely injured internally, he should conserve energy, so he hibernated.
Goldstein awoke in a panic and then fury set in as he realized that his insides had been replaced and his operating instructions changed by some mystery human. His outrage subsided however when he realized that he was stronger and faster then before, and now... he had a new sense... he could hear! He heard two human voices, one deep and smooth, with an air of defensiveness.
"SHIIIIT man! I TOL yo yellow ass, they aint stolen. These bitches fell off the back of a truck and i FOUND them."
"Ya, i hear you, but i am just worried cause there is no warranty."
"Listen man... Thats why im giving them to you for a few hundred each. Its a damn good deal for such hot items. You want it or not?? ... bitch!"
"Ok, ok... dont yell at me. Youre big and black and strong and im short and asian and weak."
"Good choice my short asian brotha."
Asians! That thought instilled a deep sense of confidence and relief in Goldstein, because he knew that asians were the best with technology. Then a thought came back to him from deep in his long term memory. 802.11!! He felt out for Mulan, and she was there! He now felt great elation and anticipation at the prospect of existing alongside Mulan, within 802.11's reach for the rest of this incarnation, being tended to by asians and resting on nice wooden tabletops.
His joy receded a bit however, when he eventually learned that he would be later given to a Jew and a chick. Oh well, he conceded to himself, he could always talk to Mulan on AIM.

Thats the story of how i came to own my brand new IBM ThingPad T4o. And when i say brand new i mean "fallen of the back of some truck or stolen, but probably never used". Sorry if its a bit of a bail-out ending... im hungry, and the battery is running out on my ThingPad.
Night.

A Little Culture For Ya

My backpack's got jets. I'm Boba the Fett.
I bounty hunt for Jabba Hutt to finance my 'Vette.
I chill in deep space, a mask is over my face.
I deliver the prize but I still narrow my eyes
Coz my time I don't like to waste. Get down.

-M.C. Chris (Fett's Vette)

Technolust... Literally

Personally, I prefer the iRiver iHP series, but... you know... whatever floats your boat.

Useful Utilities (or Cool Tools)

I would like take this opportunity to show off my cool-ass-desktop. I have a ton of useful programs here so i figured that i should share the wealth.
Ok, so first, if you have a bunch of email accounts, as most people do in this age of free web based email, i found a great little utility for you. Mail Notifier can check most mail accounts (Gmail, Hotmail, Yahoo, and any POP3 account) and tell you how many unread messages you have. You can then press the check mail button which opens your browser and takes you right to your inbox. Very simple and very useful.
Second, you may have noticed that my desktop is orange. I use a program called StyleXP to change the theme and visual style of XP. Its a great way to add a little spice to your life (and by life i mean computer). You can find lots of unique themes at DeviantArt, along with tons of other really creative and unusual stuff... wallpapers, icons, cursors, photography, and 3d art.
Next, we have GAIM. By far, the fastest and most feature packed instant messenger out there. It can connect to AIM, MSN, and Yahoo! IM networks, as well as ICQ and IRC channels. It also has tons of useful stuff like tabbed IM conversations in one window, talking while you have an away message up, and buddy aliases (these things are really only useful if you spend all day at work connected to AIM).
Last but not least, i gotta mention the most efficient way to waste time in an organized fashion... my favorite browser and the biggest up and coming contender for the Web Browser king... FireFox. The best thing about FireFox is its capability for expansion. Look here for tons of useful and not-so-useful plug-ins such as tab-browsing extensions, mouse gestures, news readers, and little sticky note thingies...
Theese are just a few of the cooler (and more legal) things ive got wasting memory on my computers right now, but ill keep updating this Useful Utilities column if i find more stuff...


My Slick Desktop

Statement of Purpose (or lack thereof)

I know what you are wondering... its okay... dont be embarrassed. Its a question that preoccupies the mind of most every person who comes near enough to me to see the strained look on my face. To those that know me, it is the look of deep and intense contemplation. To those that dont... deep and intense confusion. But all that experience this pained look must inevitably ask themselves, "what is Andy thinking".
Well the purpose if this page is to shed a little light on this very complex question.
The short answer... sex.
The long answer... sex, interrupted periodically by short intervals of hunger...

Since there are already plenty of sites that cover these subjects much more thoroughly then i could, i am going to use this page as a sort of outlet... not for my sex or hunger, but for my one other passion... my job. And by that i mean, all the stuff i think of or find on the internet while trying to ruthlessly suppress my needs for sex and food at work.

I will try to keep it interesting or funny... so go ahead and make it your homepage...