Zeph

"Me and The Big Guy"

2006-07-02T10:00:11Z

http://www.atomfilms.com/af/content/atom_1352 in the spirit of 1984, here's a cool short film about a guy who really doesn't seem to mind Big Brother, or The Big Guy as he calls him.

To hell with Scientology

2006-03-24T10:10:18Z

A fun bunch of reasons why Scientology sucks:

http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/story/9363363/inside_scientology recent article with a great look inside
http://www.clambake.org/archive/books/bfm/bfmconte.htm book-length biography/esposé on L Ron Hubbard
http://www.xenu.net/ massive informational site
http://xenutv.com/ links to the semi-banned South Park episode
http://www.ronthenut.org/ the site design is as bad as the content is great

"Rugburn for your Ears"

2006-02-23T05:02:29Z

Great place to hear some really craptacular video game voice tracks

Also: Pimp your ride! Mach Schnell! (also check out the commercial on the VW web site)

ZOMGWTF!!!!1one

2006-02-13T06:49:36Z

I've been on a guitar kick for the better part of a week now, and googling around I found Kaki King. If you haven't heard her, she just phenomenal, and really unlike anything I've heard, thought I would describe her playing as a mix of folk, jazz, some rock elements, and percussion. Check out some of her video samples on http://www.kakiking.com/. She's on the iTunes Music Store too, I just bought her newer album, "Legs to Make Us Longer". Half of me wants to give up playing the guitar now*, as I've found something that totally impresses me, the other half is inspired to play and compose more.

* (I've been playing since I was 14, but I've had blocks of years where I've only picked it up once every several months, so my technique has suffered and stagnated. Anyone interested in jamming, lemme know!.)

I for one welcome out Intel overlords!

2005-06-06T18:27:58Z

So it's official. I was on the macrumors.com IRC server with thousands of other mac geeks and goons watching the events unfold before our eyes. I sure hope that if apple picks an initial chip to go with it will be x86-64.

We're all sure they're not going to be stock hardware inside, and these new Macs will continue to use OpenFirmware instead of whatever BIOS the x86-64 chips use. It occurred to me that if you ran the OS X xnu kernel on top of a nanokernel that included emulated OpenFirmware, you could run Intel OS X on a stock PC. Of course, you'd still be running a stock PC ;-)

[edit] Apparently, they aren't using OF on Intel Macs, but I haven't seen a mention of what they WILL use, but surely it won't be a vanilla x86 BIOS. I'm not looking forward to seeing 'PRESS F11 TO CHANGE BIOS SETTINGS' when starting up my future Mac (not like I ever shut it down anyway)

DORM WARS!

2005-05-31T18:18:54Z

By far the most fun I have had reading anything in a long time, is the story Dorm Wars, posted as a series of Diary entries on k5. It's sort of like The Big U, or Animal House meets Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas. Good stuff.

Here are the links, in order:

Dorm Wars 1
Dorm Wars 2
Dorm Wars 2.5
Dorm Wars 3
Dorm Wars 4
Dorm Wars 5
Dorm Wars 6
Dorm Wars 7
Dorm Wars 8
Dorm Wars 9
Dorm Wars 10
Dorm Wars 11
Dorm Wars 12
Dorm Wars 13
Dorm Wars 14
Dorm Wars 15
Dorm Wars 16
Dorm Wars 17
Dorm Wars 18
also, The Guitar F*cker story mentioned.

Enjoy!

I heart Santa Cruz

2005-05-25T06:23:33Z

Found a 20+ minute mp3 of the waves at Pleasure Point, which I am slowly downloading. I think I'm gonna move back soon. Eventually my inertia will run out of steam and I'll start decending into the gravity well around the Bay Area :-)

hard drive...failing...

2005-05-02T19:12:29Z

...KHAAAAAAAN!

Anyway, yeah, my external firewire hard drive is failing, and I don't want to lose my gigs and gigs of music, movies, and other accumulated goodies - I have no DVD or even CD burner. The drive is getting nigh on 6 or 7 years old now, and has been active, or at least on, pretty much the entire time.

If anyone has a spare drive, at least 60GB, it would be greately appreciated, I can even paypal you the shipping cost :-) I just need a normal internal hard drive, since I use a firewire kit, ATA-66-whatever-works; don't worry about formatting it, I'll do that (unless you want to delete private data). Since I'm poor right now, I can't afford to buy one :-(

Leave a msg me here if you can help :-D

Zombie Survival Test

2005-04-29T16:23:50Z

Take 'The Zombie Scenario Survivor Test' http://www.okcupid.com/tests/take?testid=5349989821747660792

"Official Survivor
Congratulations! You scored 82%!
Whether through ferocity or quickness, you made it out. You made the right choice most of the time, but you probably screwed up somewhere. Nobody's perfect, at least you're alive."

my nü site

2005-03-14T22:46:02Z

Why would I need a site when I have LJ? I dunno, something to do.

Check it out, yo. zephc.s5.com

Oh My God...

2005-03-12T16:12:44Z

...It's Full of Cosbys!

House of Cosbys.

A good Webcomic

2005-03-02T18:30:23Z

The Perry Bible Fellowship

Outrage

2005-02-19T18:10:06Z

Well, I'm not really outraged, but a little dumbstruck by something: I was looking up info on RDBMS (Relational Database Management Systems) stuff, to you know, add keywords to my resume ;-). In any event, I was struck by how primitive the connection stuff is, e.g. setting up config files (this is in Java b.t.w.) with some setup/wizerd app thing, which generates the various Java src and config files. See here. I watched a video of Steve Jobs building a simple demo database app in NeXTSTEP 3.0, using just Interface Builder, and writing NO CODE, and connecting to databases and tables with the Database Kit (this is the closest thing I could find) using simple drag-n-drop. This demo was made IN 1990. What the hell is going on? Why are we using technology now that is less advanced than technology 15 years ago? Am I suddenly in the Bizarro Universe?

Also, I had a bday on the 17th, 26 now, yay me!

Happy Steak & BJ Day!

2005-02-15T00:35:14Z

http://www.steakandbjday.com/

6 hours!

2005-01-04T19:17:54Z

Well I had part two of my interview at a tech place, doing object-oriented perl, heh. Looks like it would be interesting. They had me do a couple tasks on a whiteboard, then sat me in a room to code by myself. The first part was 1.5 hours, the second ended up at 4.5 hours - yes, a 6 hour interview. I got home a little before 9 PM, as it was a 45 minute drive each way. But this could be a really great opportunity for me, and a lot more $$ than I'm making at my retail job. The other prorgammers there seem to have a lot of fun, very casual, very un-Michigan.

It's supposed to snow a lot in a few days, so I'm glad I didn't have to drive thru all that for an interview that might go nowhere (but I'm hoping it does).

That is all.

iamzeph @ 2004-12-09T17:01:00

2004-12-09T22:02:49Z

haha:

also, if you're interested in LISP, here's a cool introduction: http://www.lisperati.com/

Ups and Downs

2004-11-19T22:43:20Z

Today has been a mix of ups and downs. Somehow the downs outweigh the ups:

Up: I got to sleep in.

Down: My 95 year old grandma is in the hospital, recovering from slight pneumonia. I hope she feels better soon.

Up: Work was only four hours today.

Down: My friend Eliezer's brother Yehuda died at the too-young age of 19. If you can, donate a few bucks. Eliezer's work is far more beneficial to humanity than what most can do locally. Death has outlived its usefulness to us.

I'm looking for another Up today. Here's hopin'.

work

2004-11-09T02:46:10Z

Well, I finally have a job, working at a sports store called Dick's. It's fun, lotsa nice people, and business tends to be slow enough that I don;t have to stress it. I work in the footwear department; it's part time/seasonal (xmas season), but I recon I'll be working close to a 40-hour work week, and can always hire on full-time if I don't find any coding work.

I drank some wal-mart orange juice, and it's giving me heartburn, damnit.

I don't have work til 4 PM tomorrow, so I'm gonna sleep in, yum yum.

17 Reasons Not to Slit Your Wrists by Michael Moore

2004-11-06T03:33:32Z

Got this from my dear m'ma.
=============================================
Dear Friends,

Ok, it sucks. Really sucks. But before you go and cash it all in, let's, in the words of Monty Python, 'always look on the bright side of life!' There IS some good news from Tuesday's election.

Here are 17 reasons not to slit your wrists:

1. It is against the law for George W. Bush to run for president again.

2. Bush's victory was the NARROWEST win for a sitting president since Woodrow Wilson in 1916.

3. The only age group in which the majority voted for Kerry was young adults (Kerry: 54%, Bush: 44%), proving once again that your parents are always wrong and you should never listen to them.

4. In spite of Bush's win, the majority of Americans still think the country is headed in the wrong direction (56%), think the war wasn't worth fighting (51%), and don't approve of the job George W. Bush is doing (52%). (Note to foreigners: Don't try to figure this one out. It's an American thing, like Pop Tarts.)

5. The Republicans will not have a filibuster-proof 60-seat majority in the Senate. If the Democrats do their job, Bush won't be able to pack the Supreme Court with right-wing ideologues. Did I say "if the Democrats do their job?" Um, maybe better to scratch this one.

6. Michigan voted for Kerry! So did the entire Northeast, the birthplace of our democracy. So did 6 of the 8 Great Lakes States. And the whole West Coast! Plus Hawaii. Ok, that's a start. We've got most of the fresh water, all of Broadway, and Mt. St. Helens. We can dehydrate them or bury them in lava. And no more show tunes!

7. Once again we are reminded that the buckeye is a nut, and not just any old nut -- a poisonous nut. A great nation was felled by a poisonous nut. May Ohio State pay dearly this Saturday when it faces Michigan.

8. 88% of Bush's support came from white voters. In 50 years, America will no longer have a white majority. Hey, 50 years isn't such a long time! If you're ten years old and reading this, your golden years will be truly golden and you will be well cared for in your old age.

9. Gays, thanks to the ballot measures passed on Tuesday, cannot get married in 11 new states. Thank God. Just think of all those wedding gifts we won't have to buy now.

10. Five more African Americans were elected as members of Congress, including the return of Cynthia McKinney of Georgia. It's always good to have more blacks in there fighting for us and doing the job our candidates can't.

11. The CEO of Coors was defeated for Senate in Colorado. Drink up!

12. Admit it: We like the Bush twins and we don't want them to go away.

13. At the state legislative level, Democrats picked up a net of at least 3 chambers in Tuesday's elections. Of the 98 partisan-controlled state legislative chambers (house/assembly and senate), Democrats went into the 2004 elections in control of 44 chambers, Republicans controlled 53 chambers, and 1 chamber was tied. After Tuesday, Democrats now control 47 chambers, Republicans control 49 chambers, 1 chamber is tied and 1 chamber (Montana House) is still undecided.

14. Bush is now a lame duck president. He will have no greater moment than the one he's having this week. It's all downhill for him from here on out -- and, more significantly, he's just not going to want to do all the hard work that will be expected of him. It'll be like everyone's last month in 12th grade -- you've already made it, so it's party time! Perhaps he'll treat the next four years like a permanent Friday, spending even more time at the ranch or in Kennebunkport. And why shouldn't he? He's already proved his point, avenged his father and kicked our ass.

15. Should Bush decide to show up to work and take this country down a very dark road, it is also just as likely that either of the following two scenarios will happen: a) Now that he doesn't ever need to pander to the Christian conservatives again to get elected, someone may whisper in his ear that he should spend these last four years building "a legacy" so that history will render a kinder verdict on him and thus he will not push for too aggressive a right-wing agenda; or b) He will become so cocky and arrogant -- and thus, reckless -- that he will commit a blunder of such major proportions that even his own party will have to remove him from office.

16. There are nearly 300 million Americans -- 200 million of them of voting age. We only lost by three and a half million! That's not a landslide -- it means we're almost there. Imagine losing by 20 million. If you had 58 yards to go before you reached the goal line and then you barreled down 55 of those yards, would you stop on the three yard line, pick up the ball and go home crying -- especially when you get to start the next down on the three yard line? Of course not! Buck up! Have hope! More sports analogies are coming!!!

17. Finally and most importantly, over 55 million Americans voted for the candidate dubbed "The #1 Liberal in the Senate." That's more than the total number of voters who voted for either Reagan, Bush I, Clinton or Gore. Again, more people voted for Kerry than Reagan. If the media are looking for a trend it should be this -- that so many Americans were, for the first time since Kennedy, willing to vote for an out-and-out liberal. The country has always been filled with evangelicals -- that is not news. What IS news is that so many people have shifted toward a Massachusetts liberal. In fact, that's BIG news. Which means, don't expect the mainstream media, the ones who brought you the Iraq War, to ever report the real truth about November 2, 2004. In fact, it's better that they don't. We'll need the element of surprise in 2008.

Feeling better? I hope so. As my friend Mort wrote me yesterday, "My Romanian grandfather used to say to me, 'Remember, Morton, this is such a wonderful country -- it doesn't even need a president!'"

But it needs us. Rest up, I'll write you again tomorrow.

Yours,

Michael Moore
MMFlint@aol.com
www.michaelmoore.com

I, Neocon

2004-11-03T19:14:21Z

The three laws:
1. A Neocon may not injure a corporation, or, through inaction, allow a corporation to come to harm.
2. A Neocon must obey the orders given it by corporations except where such orders would conflict with the First Law.
3. A Neocon must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Law.

[ adapted from http://billmon.org/archives/001612.html ]

haha

2004-10-22T22:43:52Z

thank you somethingawful.com, i love you.

been reading some zombie fan fiction

2004-10-13T21:40:05Z

came across this weird one, a zombie-Matrix cross-over http://www.allthingszombie.com/fiction/netzombie.php

fun stuff

2004-10-01T04:53:24Z

http://www.dilbert.com/comics/dilbert/duh/tour.html is the Dilbert Ultimate House (DUH), kinda cool, fun

I've been reading this book which is a bunch of interviews with the Dalai Lama, called The Art of Happiness. I was a bit skeptical of what I would find, but it's a great read. Confirmed a lot of my own views (book was written by a psychiatrist). I recommend it.

hi party people

2004-09-29T18:09:47Z

i'm still lookin for work. I applied at wal-mart, at the little computer machine thing they have. It has a terrible keyboard (Wall-mounted keyboards are very futuristic, they need more of those there!). It was interesting putting in my extensive QA and Web expertise in there for a job doing whatever. I also applied for a job thats 80 miles away, because they actually replied to my resume posted on some job search place. Lastly, I randomly wrote to some company that I found randomly in the phonebook (the very last name/company in it), because their site was in disrepair (broken links and images, almost no text) and it was like dated 2000 I think, so I offered to update it for them. They're in the phone book, and I guess are still around, so who knows, I might get a reply back.

Finally saw Secret Window last night, the ending was pretty dumb, and I figured out quickly from the beginning who the guy from Mississippi really was. I don't think Stephen King has ever been scary to me. I tried reading Salems Lot once, but it was really dull.

work? anywhere?

2004-09-22T15:38:01Z

Well, I'm still unemployed, but I interviewed a couple weeks ago, and the company is being very slow about a second interview, if there will even be one at all. I'm not hedging my bets, and I may end up working at Wal-Mart or some such before too long if no one hires me. It's all about the connections, see?

I got my hair cut a few weeks ago, and that is a weird change fo' sho'.

My gf is in her Sr year of college, and I ride with her to class Wednesday mornings until I get a job... I need a job damnit, I don't like freezing my ass off next to smokey, noisy, dangerous traffic.

I'm working on a Programming language called "Spaceballs: The Programming Language" but I fear I better change it lest the MPAA swoops down on me... suggestions? It's a C superset, like Objective-C, but without all the (IMO) nasty Smalltakish syntax, more like 'obj:method(arg1, arg2);'. I have the runtime coming along well, though I need to work on speeding up the dynamic method call system (uses slow the strcmp(), rather than jump tables or whatever)... I'm looking into the Obj-C method lookup caching system.

That's all I can think of. If anyone has work for a programmer, and can pay, let me know por favor =]