For Peter's Sake

Old friends

noreply@blogger.com (Peter) — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 17:34:00 +0000

I had a really vivid dream last night with all of my friends from college. Everyone I knew was there -- roommates, good friends, classmates, coworkers, you name it. We laughed and hugged and caught up on what everyone was doing now.

I was so disappointed when I woke up. I suddenly miss them all terribly.

Slow down

noreply@blogger.com (Peter) — Tue, 07 Jul 2009 18:06:00 +0000

Despite emails discouraging employees from viewing the Michael Jackson memorial service online, it appears that dozens of my colleagues are doing just that, because the network is running like molasses in February.

That's pretty much how it is

noreply@blogger.com (Peter) — Mon, 06 Jul 2009 21:13:00 +0000

Via stereotypist.

Why BMI is junk science.

noreply@blogger.com (Peter) — Mon, 06 Jul 2009 16:34:00 +0000

NPR had an interesting article over the weekend about the BMI, or body-mass index. BMI is commonly used as an indicator of fitness, but as the article reveals, it's really "junk science." It's accurate sometimes, but it's often wrong, and it's based on bad math and the formula is rigged to produce the right data. After reading the article, I'm persuaded. Anyone have any arguments in favor of the BMI?

Via reddit.

The weekend of nothing special

noreply@blogger.com (Peter) — Mon, 06 Jul 2009 02:19:00 +0000

I got Friday off work, but we had a decidedly unambitious weekend. We lazed about the house Friday morning, which is always nice. Then we picked up some groceries at Walmart, which apparently was a huge mistake. Walmart is always crazy on the day before a holiday. Incidentally, I just realized that I had typed Walmart instead of Wal-Mart. I guess they officially changed their name to remove the hyphen when they redid the logo. I happened to see a newly constructed Walmart in Ohio last week, and it had the new blue and yellow color scheme with the sunburst design. Our local store, however, is stuck in the mid-90's. It's pretty much the worst-managed store I've ever seen. Nothing is ever in stock and it's kind of shabby. But it's close and cheap, so it gets my vote every time.

We tidied up the place a little bit on Friday afternoon because Becca's sister came to visit. We had been planning to have her visit for a while, so it was fun to see her. She brought a couple Wii controllers and wheels, so we played four-player Mario Kart Wii with her and my daughter. My daughter definitely dragged down the team score, spinning circles and falling into lava the whole time. But she was so enthusiastic that we didn't mind, and we won most of the time anyway.

Becca's mom and brother ended up coming to visit for the weekend, too, so they came around lunch time. We had considered a busy day of parades, boating, and fireworks. But the Firstborn probably wouldn't do too well with fireworks, and taking a 8 1/2-month pregnant woman water-skiing probably isn't a good idea. So we had a more laid-back Fourth of July, doing some shopping at McKay Books, our favorite used bookstore, and Trader Joe's. I actually like Trader Joe's. I hate Whole Foods with a passion, but Trader Joe's is okay. Don't know why I make that distinction, but there it is.

It ended up pouring rain while I was trying to grill up hamburgers and grilled veggie-kebabs, but we eventually got the job done on the porch with an umbrella. We didn't see any real fireworks, but we watched some on TV and made fun of a Neil Diamond concert. That was the extent of our ambition for the evening. That's pretty much all the adventure we need right now. And with Little Girl #2 coming within the next two weeks, we'll have plenty of adventure ahead of us.

Small living

noreply@blogger.com (Peter) — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 20:49:00 +0000

Now that we moved into a larger place, I've been thinking about how much space it takes to live comfortably. As anyone knows who has travelled outside the U.S., most of the world's population lives in considerably smaller dwellings than most Americans. A year or two ago I read an article similar to this one that talked about how smaller houses could be a growing housing trend.

The truth is that most people really don't need the size home they have. Most American homes are very inefficient in terms of using space. A European- or Japanese-style efficiency apartment can be 500 square feet or smaller, and yet fit a whole family reasonably well. I've even heard of old shipping containers being converted to stackable apartments, and apparently that trend is coming to the U.S. We were at an IKEA store last week, and they had several small model apartments furnished with their space-saving furniture that looked quite comfortable. We actually got a new kitchen table and chairs there that fold up and save a lot of space in our small kitchen.

I am actually quite used to smaller living spaces. I grew up in a large family, so I almost always shared a bedroom with one of my brothers. In college I lived in absurdly small and crowded dormitories and apartments. Even after Becca and I got married, our apartments were small, especially the tiny studio apartment that we rented off Pennsylvania Ave. in D.C. It had two rooms -- a main room and a kitchen -- with one closet, a mini-fridge, and a fold-down Murphy bed.

To be honest, I enjoyed the small places we lived. They were all efficiently organized of necessity, so we could pack a lot into the small space. Whether by habit or by nature, we still function in a relatively small space. We spend most of our days in the upstairs of our apartment, going downstairs only when we do laundry or watch a movie. My major problem with small living is all of my stuff -- I have quite a bit of camping and hiking gear, books, and clothes. I think I could live comfortably in a micro-home -- as long as that home had some macro-closet space.

I deserve a medal

noreply@blogger.com (Peter) — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 14:43:00 +0000

Today I got a call on my cell phone while I was in a public restroom. And then I did something that no one else seems to be able to do.

I did not answer the call.

The King of Pop's patent

noreply@blogger.com (Peter) — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 16:30:00 +0000

It turns out that Michael Jackson invented more than dance moves and catchy tunes. He actually has a patent for a device that let him lean out beyond his center of gravity. The patent involved shoes that clipped into a pin in the floor, keeping the feet in place no matter how far the wearer was leaning. The result was a pretty cool look. You can see it in action here:

It's actually a slick device. The same effect could be achieved by cables, but that didn't work for live shows. As you can see in the video, Michael Jackson and his dancers did the amazing gravity-defying tilt and then simply continued with the rest of the dance, which would be impossible with cables.

The patent is pretty interesting too. Thanks to Google Patents, you can see the whole patent application here. The shoes had ankle support that helped the dancers lean out and come back in. Still, even with ankle support, it looks like a very difficult move. They make it look easy in the video.

Web Site Story

noreply@blogger.com (Peter) — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 13:56:00 +0000

This is one of the best comedy videos I have ever seen online. Period. Seriously, check it out. I usually don't like CollegeHumor videos, but this one is hilarious and quite clever.

How to alienate your fans

noreply@blogger.com (Peter) — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 19:11:00 +0000

Blizzard has confirmed that there will be no LAN (local area network) mode for StarCraft 2. That sucks. I often have difficulties with Blizzard's servers. I don't want StarCraft to go the way of WoW, or I won't buy it. Sometimes I just want to sit down with my wife and have some quality frag time at home without dealing with the hassle of Battle.net. Is that too much to ask?

Fun on Monday: The Best of Jay Leno's Headlines

noreply@blogger.com (Peter) — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 14:37:00 +0000

I'm really going to miss Jay Leno on the Tonight Show. Don't think I'll watch it with Conan O'Brien. He's not really funny to me. But most importantly, he doesn't have the two major things that made me watch Jay Leno: Jaywalking and Headlines. As he wrapped up his 17-year stint as the host of the Tonight Show, Jay Leno reviewed some of the best Headlines. My favorite one is the awkward lawyer reference below, but there are plenty of good ones in this collection. Check it out here!

Car maps

noreply@blogger.com (Peter) — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 13:00:00 +0000

I have been on a maps kick lately. My latest one is from a NY Times article about what cars are really "American." It turns out that a lot of American auto makers have the parts made in Mexico or Canada, so they aren't really "American." And some foreign auto makers actually produce all of their cars in the U.S. So this map breaks it down by brand and model so you can see where everything is made. Cool, huh? Thanks to Soren for this one.

noreply@blogger.com (Peter) — Fri, 26 Jun 2009 00:01:00 +0000

Whoa. First Farrah Fawcett passed away, and now Michael Jackson is dead. White female celebrities are dropping like flies.

Obligatory Michael Jackson joke: Michael Jackson converted to Islam before he died. So does he get 70 virgins in the afterlife if he already had them in this life?

Fun on Monday: Nuanced, Ambivalent, or Guarded Stickers

noreply@blogger.com (Peter) — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 12:00:00 +0000

I'm not a bumper sticker person. I don't feel the need to advertise my political affiliation, sense of humor, or sports team of choice on my bumper. I do sometimes have sticker of my alma mater, but I don't at the moment. So when I saw these bumper stickers I thought they were hilarious. The perfectly express my puzzlement with the bumper sticker phenomenon. Here's my favorite one -- it's actually dead on for me, since we drive almost identical cars.

I actually found them through Ken Jennings' blog. Yes, the former Jeopardy! whiz has a blog. He's pretty funny, actually, and while some of his posts are trivia-related, most of it is humorous observations. I recommend it too.

Conversation in a crib

noreply@blogger.com (Peter) — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 17:24:00 +0000

The following exchange happened when I went to get my daughter out of bed:

Me: Good morning, sweetheart.
Her: Good morning, Daddy!
Me: Let's get you changed; I have to go to work soon.
Her: Daddy, don't go to work. Stay home with me and eat carrots.
Me: Um, do you want a carrot for breakfast?
Her: Yes.

How could I resist an offer as enticing as staying home with my two-year-old and eating carrots?

Fun on Monday: Geosense

noreply@blogger.com (Peter) — Mon, 15 Jun 2009 13:28:00 +0000

Becca does a great Casual Game Friday series of posts about casual video games you can find online. Today's Fun on Monday is encroaching on that area a bit, so I hope she doesn't mind too much. Geosense is a very simple geography game that you can play by yourself or against other people online. It gives you a city and country and you have six seconds to find it on a map. And these aren't just the country's capitals -- the questions could be any major city in any country. And as I soon found out, there are a lot of cities that I have heard of but only have a vague notion as to where they are located. Once you click a location on the map, you see a blue target where you clicked and a yellow target where the city is actually located. It's always embarrassing when those circles don't even overlap.

Geosense is fun in a kinda nerdy way. It's basically a bunch of information that you really ought to know as an informed citizen, but don't. After a round of 10 you can see how fast you respond and how many kilometers away from the actual cities you were on average. I've been getting my average error rate under 250 kilometers lately, which I consider to be pretty good. Some of them I can get pretty close, but I am pretty far off on places like Ammassalik, Greenland. So encourage your inner nerd and give it a try. If you really like it you can play against other people online, or even get a free account and track your improvement.

Clash of the music festivals

noreply@blogger.com (Peter) — Wed, 10 Jun 2009 18:55:00 +0000

Nashville is known as Music City, but it's about to get out of control this weekend. Middle Tennessee about to play host to not one but two massive music festivals. The first and craziest will be Bonnaroo, a Woodstock-style multi-day series of concerts with a huge line-up of bands. Bonnaroo is actually held outside of Nashville, on a farm in Manchester, Tennessee. But I've already seen the road-trippers making their way through the city in cars loaded up with tents and coolers. Some of the better-known acts at Bonnaroo this year include the Beastie Boys, Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band, Phish, Nine Inch Nails, Elvis Costello, Al Green, and more than a dozen other groups and artists that you'd recognize. Bonnaroo has something for everyone. I've never been -- and probably won't ever go -- but my friends who have say it's an amazing and exhausting four-day experience.

Even as Bonnaroo is heating up the countryside, the CMA Music Festival will be getting into full swing here in Nashville proper. I've never been a country music fan, but even I have to admit that the CMA Music Festival has some of the best acts in the business. With so many country music stars living in town or in the suburbs, it's easy to get them in the show. Reba McEntire, Brad Paisley, Rascal Flatts, Brooks & Dunn, and Martina McBride are just a few of the big-name stars. Downtown Nashville gets crazy during "Fan Fair" (as it used to be called), and the whole city is already full of traffic with out-of-towners. Most of the downtown streets are blocked off for foot traffic, there are concerts all over, and you see some of the stupidest outfits imaginable. I've never seen so many cut-off jean shorts with cowboy boots in all my life. But it looks like a lot of fun.

Bonnaroo and CMA Fest normally don't happen on the same weekend, but this year they coincide and it's going to be a busy weekend as a result. I plan on staying on the other side of town as much as possible, but since I work downtown I won't be able to avoid the faux-cowboys. It'll be a little hectic, but I can probably put up with it. After all, the Music City has to live up to its name.

Photo credit: hrtmnstrfr.

Pre envy

noreply@blogger.com (Peter) — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 16:01:00 +0000

My coworker just got the new Palm Pre, and it looks pretty sweet. I think it looks cooler than an iPhone in terms of pure aesthetics, and it's smaller than I thought it would be. She let me play around with it a little bit, it was surprisingly intuitive and easy to use. She said it was actually easy to set up her Exchange email account, and it has a healthy set of apps already, with more sure to come. I listened to Pandora Radio, played with the GPS features, and surfed the web a bit. It was pretty decent.

The device isn't perfect yet, and there are a few small quirks. For example, you can't currently change the alarm tone for receiving text messages like you can for ring tones. But that can be easily fixed in a firmware upgrade. I don't think it'll be an iPhone killer, but the Pre looks very good so far. I'm impressed, and I totally want one.

Chipotle in Nashville!

noreply@blogger.com (Peter) — Mon, 08 Jun 2009 15:07:00 +0000

This is the best news I've seen in a long time! From the Nashville Post:

The papers were pulled this week for the construction of Tennessee's first Chipotle Mexican Grill at 2825 West End Ave. Shaub Construction Co. is handling the work, which is going to cost $430,000.

That's boring business speech for "Chipotle burritos are about to blow Nashville's culinary mind!" The restaurant gods have smiled upon us. Now I won't have to wait until we make our period trips to Ohio before I can enjoy the 3-lb lump of deliciousness that is a Chipotle burrito.

Photo credit: Thomas Hawk.

Comcast sucks . . . again

noreply@blogger.com (Peter) — Thu, 04 Jun 2009 18:49:00 +0000

My list of why Comcast sucks just goes on and on, but today's reason is kind of funny. Our service at home went out this afternoon, so we didn't have any Internet or TV. Becca called me at work on her cell phone and I called Comcast to tell them about the problem. The first time I called I sat on hold for a while until the automated voice operator said they couldn't answer my call right then, and they hung up on me. The second time I called I got an answer, but the phone service representative just said that they were having outages in the area and that it would be fixed soon. We did have some storms today, so that's understandable. But the best part was the latter part of the conversation:

Comcast: I see that your location is available for digital phone service, with unlimited nation-wide calling. Would you be interested in adding this service for a total of $99/month?
Me: (laughing incredulously) Well, my TV and Internet services are already out. Why would I want my phone to go out too?

HOA's ruin all the fun!

noreply@blogger.com (Peter) — Thu, 04 Jun 2009 12:00:00 +0000

Gapminder World

noreply@blogger.com (Peter) — Wed, 03 Jun 2009 12:00:00 +0000

You already know I like maps and charts, right? Well this one blew my mind. Gapminder World is an interactive chart that plots income and life expectancy in all countries over the last two centuries. That' sounds really boring, but if you play with it for a minute you soon discover all sorts of fascinating things. For example, if you select one of the countries you can watch the rise and fall of the nation's fortunes. Japan experiences a meteoric rise prior to World War II and then both income and life expectancy plummet. In some Latin American countries incomes fall even as life expectancies rise due to improved medical care. The dots on the map grow with population, so you can see the expanding population of the U.S. through immigration. You can see the enormous loss of life in the Chinese cultural revolution and the crushing poverty in Afghanistan under the Taliban. It's all there on the graph.

The Old Republic video game trailer

noreply@blogger.com (Peter) — Tue, 02 Jun 2009 13:43:00 +0000

Hot on the heels of the Star Wars/Shakespeare in Love spoof, I ran across this game trailer for Star Wars: The Old Republic on Reddit this morning. It's probably the best game trailer I've ever seen -- if it was a movie it would probably be better than Attack of the Clones. 'Tis a shame that the game is online and that I'll never play it. Paying a monthly fee is against my video gaming religion.

Fun on Monday: George Lucas in Love

noreply@blogger.com (Peter) — Mon, 01 Jun 2009 21:29:00 +0000

I didn't do a Fun on Monday last week because hopefully you got the day off and had a little bit of real fun. But I'm back in the office, so I need a bit of entertainment. And I happened to have caught Shakespeare in Love over the weekend. It's a great movie that imagines the story behind the writing of Romeo and Juliet. Will Shakespeare has severe writer's block unless he's in love. And he doesn't know what to write in the play he is supposed to have written, until he runs into Viola. But the fates are against them, because he's just a lowly actor and Viola is to be married to a rich nobleman -- thus the inspiration for the star-crossed lovers in Romeo & Juliet.

George Lucas in Love spoofs Shakespeare in Love and the Star Wars series, and it's hilarious. You don't need to have seen Shakespeare in Love to get the jokes, but if you have you can appreciate what a clever short film this is. It was done by Joe Nussbaum and a bunch of USC alumni in 1999, shortly after Shakespeare in Love won the Oscar for Best Picture and Star Wars: The Phantom Menace took the box office by storm. Unfortunately, Nussbaum's more recent films -- one of the notorious American Pie movies and a flick starring Amanda Bynes -- aren't nearly as clever. It seems that Nussbaum, like Lucas, did his best work early in his career on a tiny budget.

Why I won't ditch my TV yet

noreply@blogger.com (Peter) — Mon, 01 Jun 2009 20:49:00 +0000

We unpacked a lot over the weekend and I helped someone else move, so we took some time out to relax a little bit after putting my daughter to bed. We kicked back and ended up watching some movies on TV. One of them was Walk the Line, the Johnny Cash biopic. I thought it was rather underwhelming, but worth what I paid to see it. We also caught Shakespeare in Love, which is a great film in every respect.

As we were watching the movies, I got to thinking about how TV is changing because of online video. It's no secret that I like Hulu and other video sites that let me watch television programs online. Hulu, TV.com, Miro, ABC Video, and PBS Video are a great way to watch my shows nowadays. But I won't replace my normal TV set anytime soon, and here's why:

Sometimes it's nice to plunk down and flip through the channels. Almost all video online is "on-demand," which is great a lot of the time, but not if you just want to unwind for a few minutes. Even having a whole channel to watch online isn't the same as being able to flip through the channels and find something interesting.
The Couch Factor: until I get a proper DVR set up, watching TV in my home office at my computer screen is just not that comfortable. It's a lot more comfortable to lounge on a couch or armchair than a rolling office chair.
TV's are still bigger than computer monitors. We just picked up a 32-inch television on Craig's List for cheap, and it looks great. We also got a second-hand recliner from a friend to go with the one I got three years ago for $20 when Becca was pregnant and her feet were swelling. For under $100 we have a pretty tolerable home theater. Can't get that in a computer yet. And TV picture quality is a lot better, especially if it's digital cable/satellite or over-the-air signal with a digital converter.
There's a lot of rubbish on TV, but there's some good stuff too. And the varied content is often a good thing. I probably wouldn't have bothered to rent Walk the Line, but it was okay to watch on TV. It isn't always a good thing to just watch the same shows all the time. Watching traditional TV is a great way to discover new programs in a way that on-demand video doesn't allow.
TV's don't skip, freeze, buffer, or take forever to load. Even Hulu isn't always smooth for me, and some other video sites (like ABC.com) are continually buggy. TV's just turn on.

Most of these points will probably be solved eventually by online video, but they're keeping me back from only watching shows online. Someday I'll get a better DVR hooked up with MythBuntu or Boxee and I'll get the best of both worlds. And I can definitely see the day when I just use a digital antenna for local stations and a computer/DVR for other shows. But for now we'll still keep the TV around.