Meerkat Meade

Lifelogging Progress

noreply@blogger.com (Meerkatdon) — Fri, 11 May 2012 00:21:00 +0000

My current project of moving old journals and such to Evernote continues apace. By the end of the eyar, I have confidence that I'll have the total framework established: one entry for every significant day of my life, along with navigational infrastructure like calendars and such.

As I write this, I have entered all my paper journals and other records from birth to August 1979, and mixed paper/electronic records from April 1991 to the present. I'm working both forward and backward to close the gap, which is a little under 12 years. I've been able to manage doing about one month each day, most days.

Here's something I'm pretty proud of (although as I say this, that question from Friends floats through my mind: "Is patheti-sad a word?"). This is one of my monthly index pages (April 2012 to be precise), with links to each daily page. The little pictures are there to give me a rough idea of work shift (day or evening), appointments, and other activities. Click to embiggen.

Lifelogging, Journaling, Diary-Keeping, Self Storage, External Memory, Packratting, Whatever You Call It...

noreply@blogger.com (Meerkatdon) — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 23:04:00 +0000

Keeping some kind of record of one’s life is a basic human need. We write diaries and journals. We take photos and home videos. We keep mementos. We save ticket stubs, theater programs, scorecards, etc.

We try to remember, but human memory is a great deal more fallible and unreliable than we ever suspected. In our minds, we reconstruct our lives, rearrange events, erase places and people, impose false order according to narratives. And we do all this unconsciously, fully believing that our memories are true and correct.

Someday (sooner than you think) we’ll have true lifelogging -- automatic devices will record everything we see and hear, every second of every day, and it will all be stored in easy-to-access electronic archives. In the time it takes to form a query -- what was I doing five years ago? where did I leave my keys last night? what’s that restaurant we went to for Fred’s birthday a few years ago? -- we’ll have answers at our fingertips.

Science fiction writers like Robert Sawyer and Charles Stross have speculated about societies featuring such devices, and researchers like Gordon Bell are working on realizing the vision. But until then, there are some present-day tools that we can use.

In fifty-plus years, I’ve generated and collected more than my share of paper records. A journal that I’ve kept intermittently since middle school. Appointment calendars, task lists, project diaries. My beloved Dayrunner, which served me well until I converted to Claris Organizer on the Mac and then to a succession of Palms and Visors. All the paper memorabilia and keepsakes, some pasted in albums, some stuffed away in various boxes.

And then there are all the computer files, those Claris Organizer and Palm records (mostly transferred to iCal), digital journal entries, records and reports from work in a variety of wordprocessing formats. Digital photos, scans, web pages, PDFs.

Back in the Palm days, my husband taught me to keep a daily journal -- a few paragraphs jotted at the end of the day, recalling the day’s events and people, adding whatever details and reflections I want. Once I moved from Palm to iPhone, all those daily journals took their place in iCal along with everything else.

Things were great on the Palm. The search feature covered all calendar events and journal entries, so finding something particular was quick and easy. On the iPhone, not so much. Eventually it dawned on me that my daily calendar was not necessarily the best place to keep a daily journal or other information I wanted to search easily.

Enter Evernote.

If you’re not familiar with Evernote, you should be. Go to evernote.com and set up a free account.

Evernote is an online service that also has apps for desktop (Mac or Windows) and iPhone/iPad (as well as Android, Blackberry, and a ton of other devices). Evernote does two things and does both of them extremely well.

First, Evernote stores things -- text that you type or paste in, digital documents like PDFs and photos and tons of other formats, photos you take on the spot, voice memos...the variety of formats it accepts is stunning.

Second, Evernote retrieves what you stored, based on fast and comprehensive search. It searches the text (and associated tags) that you put in, but it also searches text that appears within photos (there’s some pretty sophisticated OCR going on behind the scenes.)

In addition, Evernote keeps your data synchronized across all the devices you use. Add something from your iPad, and it’s available on the web as well as on desktop, laptop, and iPhone as well.

There are bells and whistles aplenty. While your information is stored securely in the cloud, the desktop apps also keep a local copy on your computer -- so you have a physical copy of your data in your hands at all times, in case the Internet self-destructs or the company shuts down.

It does all this for free. A paid account, a bargain at $45 per year, lets you upload a larger amount each month, keeps version history of your data, allows iPhone/iPad apps to store selected data locally, and (most crucially) searches text within PDF documents.

As soon as I discovered Evernote, I started using it for my daily journal. Every day gets its own entry in Evernote: I include the date in the title of each note, like this: “Journal 20120124 Tue” -- that’s all that’s necessary. Doing the date as eight digits means that dates sort properly; including the day of the week is also useful. Then I usually copy whatever appointments I had listed for the day, followed by a few paragraphs of daily journal. I do this on whatever device is handy.

Evernote gives me back the fast search and portability I had with the Palm.

Now...deep breath...it was time to start moving my entire life into Evernote.

Prior appointments and daily journals from iCal are no problem: I can cut and paste those into an Evernote document easily on the laptop; transferring a month’s worth takes less than half an hour (it’s an excellent job to do while watching television). Ditto with other electronic resources.

But the paper . . . .

Dayrunner and appointment calendars are simple: it only takes moments to type a day’s events and appointments into Evernote. It’s those darn paper journals that are the headache...who wants to type hundreds of pages of one’s adolescent ramblings into the computer?

Enter the Fujitsu ScanSnap.

The ScanSnap is a piece of equipment so efficient and user-friendly that you’d think it’s made by Apple. It’s an unobtrusive box that sits on your desk with one big blue button shining on the front. Load the hopper with paper (it says it can take up to 50 sheets but I usually do less than that), press the blue button, and the ScanSnap gobbles down paper at 20 sheets a minute. It turns those sheets (both sides) into searchable PDFs. If you want, you can set it to send those PDFs directly to Evernote. You can also save directly to your computer, or run the excellent OCR software to make text versions.

The ScanSnap is a bit pricey, about $500, but once you have one you’ll wonder how you lived without it. You can use it (and Evernote) for much more than logging your life -- scan receipts, recipes, bills, newsletters, newspaper and magazine articles...really, anything you want.

With the ScanSnap, I am now able to scan my old journals and other memorabilia. I attach each PDF to the Evernote Journal page for that date. Evernote’s built-in OCR for PDFs is usually able to decipher my handwriting, making my handwritten journal pages as searchable as text I typed in.

I figure that once I’ve made a Journal page for every day (I have over 5,000 already, and I figure there will be upwards of 15,000 altogether), I will have a framework to which I can add things as they turn up. My college and work notebooks, with notes from classes and meetings and such. Those ticket stubs, convention programs, old cards and letters; anything that I deem part of my life story, I can scan and attach to the day’s page.

In the Journal section I’m trying to be a little selective; instead of 10 or 15 photos from a particular day, I’ll try to pick 1 or 2 really good ones. Things like receipts I’ll include if they are particularly germane to the day’s events, otherwise I put them in a Receipts section. Other paperwork gets a similar treatment. I do try to tag things with dates, so that if I do a general search for a particular day (i.e. 20120124), I’ll get everything from that date. As I continue to go through boxes and stuff from the past surfaces, I have a place to put it.

So here it is, my holy grail of lifelogging: a system that allows me to store and easily retrieve records of my whole life, complete with as much detail as I have available: pictures, video, audio, ticket stubs and receipts and playbooks and whatever else I want to add.

Before I get accused of shameless narcissism and/or foolish oversharing, let me hasten to add that all this information is for me only. I don’t share it with the world, nor do I have any desire to do so. (Technically, there’s a distinction between lifelogging, which is private done for oneself, and lifestreaming, which is public and cast out onto the Internet, but the two are often confused.) If I want to share something publicly, I use Twitter (by the way, all my tweets are automatically saved to Evernote) or a blog (likewise, all my blog posts go to Evernote).

When I was 15, I read the above panel in a Superman comic. That's how I conceive of what I'm doing here: stored and indexed by Evernote, but written by me and for me. Just call me Doctor Phoenix.

The Moral Equivalent of Religion

noreply@blogger.com (Meerkatdon) — Mon, 04 Jul 2011 20:13:00 +0000

One of the great unappreciated facts of life in the United States is that we don't need religion. We have something just as good.

What is religion for (besides enriching the ruling class)? It binds a people together in common beliefs. It provides a basis for morality. It inspires people to strive to achieve the best within themselves.

Here in the U.S. we have a secular, civil equivalent, and today is the day we celebrate that equivalent.

I'm talking about the American Mythology that we all learn in elementary school. The Mayflower. The Founding Fathers. The Revolution. The Presidency, Congress, and Supreme Court. Fort McHenry, the Stars and Stripes. Civil Rights.

This moral equivalent of religion has its scriptures: The Declaration of Independence, the Constitution (including amendments), the Gettysburg Address, and all the rest. (It has been said that the Constitution is the heart of the nation, but the Declaration is its soul.) It has its demigods and saints: Adams, Franklin, Jefferson, Washington, Lincoln, FDR, etc.

Most of all, this secular, civil system has its morality: the equality of all people, their possession of inalienable rights, the usefulness of separate states working together in peace, respect for individual and regional differences. A belief in the principles of the Enlightenment: rationality and the elevation of objective truth over emotion and deception. Universal literacy and education. Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

Also like religion, our civil system has also been used in the past to perpetrate evil: genocide of native Americans, subjugation of minorities, cruel war, perpetration of poverty and misery at home and around the globe.

The Christianists are always telling us that this is a Christian nation, founded on Christian values. They are wrong. This is an American nation, founded on American values -- and anyone who believes differently, anyone who places God (Jehovah, Allah, or whatever) above our shared American beliefs, is guilty of treason against the nation.

Fortunately, our civil system is distinct from religion in one respect: We don't kill those who believe differently, just because they disagree. (We may kill them for other reasons, particularly if we can make more money that way, but that's beside the point.)

Maybe we should start thinking about making an exception in some cases....

What We're Watching on TV

noreply@blogger.com (Meerkatdon) — Sun, 28 Mar 2010 15:54:00 +0000

Here are some of the things that we've been watching recently on TV.

The Big Bang Theory: What to say? Certainly the smartest comedy on TV. If you're a fan, geek, or nerd (or if you know & love fans, geeks, or nerds), you must watch this show. And if you don't fall into one of those categories, what are you doing reading our blog? The most recent episode, "The Pants Alternative," was hilarious. High point: Sheldon singing Tom Lehrer's Elements Song.

The Cleveland Show: Of the three shows in the Family Guy universe, this one is the weakest. It has its moments, and even at its worst it's a lot better than reality shows or (shudder) the evening news.

Family Guy: We don't care if it's written by manatees, it's a great show. Edgier and crazier than The Simpsons, not as tasteless as South Park, Family Guy has its ups and downs...but we wouldn't miss it.

FlashForward: Based on a Robert Sawyer book, this is one of several Lost wannabes that have sprung up lately. Unlike V, FlahForward has avoided too much Battlestar Galactica influence. It's nowhere near as compelling as Lost, and none of the characters have really grabbed us, but it's still worth watching.

Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood: So far, this retelling of Fullmetal Alchemist seems pretty pointless. We understand that this time around they're following the manga much more closely than the original series did, so apparently things will be diverging from the original in some pretty major ways. So we're having faith and staying tuned.

In the Life: The monthly GLBT nonfiction show. Always worth watching.

Legend of the Seeker: We've never read the books, but boy is this a good show. The plots are sophisticated, the magic system is fresh and interesting, it looks great, and the acting is very fine. Each episode is reasonably self-contained, yet there's a definite larger story that progresses. If you're not watching Legend of the Seeker, you should be. The most recent episode, "Creator," makes a nice jumping-on point because it includes a lot of flashbacks that tell the story so far.

Lost: The best drama on TV today, bar none. I don't think we can say anything about Lost that others haven't already said. A long time ago we gave up trying to second-guess or figure it out: we decided to just go along for the ride. And what a great ride it is! Lost is destined to be a classic.

The Simpsons: Well into the 21st season, and it remains one of the funniest shows out there. The Simpsons is a cultural phenomenon; miss it at your peril.

Sons of Tucson: Didn't expect much from this one. It's by some of the folks who made Malcolm in the Middle, though, and it definitely has the sheer craziness that made Malcolm great. Usually it takes a while for new shows to settle in, but the second episode ("The Break-in") was really fun and zany. This looks like a worthy successor to Malcolm.

South Park: The fourteenth season is off to a bit of a rocky start. Still, for finger-on-the-pulse satire, there's nothing better on TV. South Park isn't for everybody (in fact, the show continues to carry a warning that it "should not be viewed by anyone"), especially people who are likely to get offended by...well, offensive language and situations. We're tempted to talk about the deeper meaning of the show, but the most recent episode ("The Tale of Scrotie McBoogerballs") pretty much ruined the fun of finding deeper meanings.

Space Ghost: The original 1966-68 Hanna-Barbera cartoon, not the weird Cartoon Network talk show parody. Boomerang has started showing Space Ghost, along with Dino-Boy. This was one of Don's favorite cartoons when he was a kid, and he's happy to see that it holds up about as well as other Hanna-Barbera cartoons of the period. It's no Jonny Quest, but it does have a super-powered hero, a cute boy (Jace), a monkey wearing clothes, and a kewl spaceship.

Star Wars: Clone Wars: Fun show. It's a kid's show, so there's some simplicity of plot and if you think too much about it, some things don't make sense. However, the show has the Star Wars look & feel down pat. There's action, humor, and good characterization. The computer-generated Anakin Skywalker is two dozen times as expressive as the real Hayden Christensen. The most recent episode, "Cat and Mouse," had two additional things going for it: A Republic Admiral who looked like John Cleese, and Bail Organa's holographic appeal: "Help us, General Kenobi. You're our only hope."

What We're Waiting For:

Some shows have been on hiatus, but will be starting up again soon. We're eagerly awaiting new episodes of Doctor Who, Nova, and Smallville.

What We're Not Waiting For:

Some other shows are coming back and we couldn't care less. The most notable are Stargate: Universe and V, both of which are way too influenced by the awful Battlestar Galactica.

What We're Avoiding:

Oh, my. What an enormous list. Reality shows, network and local news, sports on TV, most sitcoms, most programming on Syfy, etc. Reruns of King of the Hill still make us run screaming. We live in constant existential dread that we may accidentally see some of Caprica.

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Another Idiot From Virginia

noreply@blogger.com (Meerkatdon) — Wed, 17 Mar 2010 13:46:00 +0000

A while ago Time Magazine ran an article debunking Jenny McCarthy's claim that vaccines cause autism. In response, they received (and printed) this letter:

TIME says "research conclusively shows that vaccines are safe for children." I recall my father, a biologist, insisting that science can prove falsity but never truth. As Albert Einstein said, "No amount of experimentation can ever prove me right; a single experiment can prove me wrong."
James Pannabecker
Natural Bridge Station, VA

Hypothesis: Vaccines cause autism.

Science has proven that hypothesis false.

Q.E.D., E.M.D.W.

After all, James, science can prove falsity but never truth.

What is it with people from Virginia? Do their brains shut down after too much exposure to cured ham, sweet tea, and moonshine? Is idiocy their genetic heritage, because all the people with brains moved out long ago? Does overexposure to racism and narrow-minded religion cause idiocy? Or is it just that they're all descended from numerous bastard offspring of Jerry Falwell?

(Note: these are all hypotheses. Science can prove them false. Science is good at that.)

[Seriously, though, we have friends in Virginia, and I owe them an apology. One and all, I'm sorry you are stuck in Virginia.]

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Humans, Persons, and Others

noreply@blogger.com (Meerkatdon) — Tue, 02 Feb 2010 16:39:00 +0000

Matthew Cornell raises a really interesting question: Are you still human when you're under general anesthesia? If self-awareness is what makes us human, then what are we when self-awareness is absent?

It's not just general anesthesia, either. What about dreamless sleep? What about the state of "flow," when one is so focused on a task that self-awareness vanishes?

Some of his commenters make a distinction (in legal terms) between "human" and "person." When unconscious, Matt is still human but is not a legal person -- indeed, the law specifies that a genuine person must make decisions for him. Similarly, the law recognizes a class of "persons" who are not human: corporations.

In the future, I can see the law recognizing other classes of nonhuman persons: cetaceans, perhaps, and/or other primates, artificial intelligences, or even sapient aliens.

Also, it seems to me that "personhood" is not simply a matter of self-awareness -- which is perhaps why I prefer the term "sapience." Self-awareness is one criterion, but there are others: intelligence, emotionality, autonomy, etc.

"Personhood" is a continuum, not on on/off switch. A rock (so far as we know) has none of these and is not a "person." A tree has more than a rock but not enough to be a "person." A hamster? Still not a person. A chimpanzee? Currently not a person, but that could change.

A human infant? Legally, not a full person...but has some of the aspects of "personhood." A severely mentally retarded human? Somewhat the same: human, but legally only partially a "person." A human fetus? A human embryo? Certainly both are less "persons" than an infant...but are they more "persons" than a chimp?

It occurs to me that a lot of the abortion debate rests on this human/person distinction. As usual in highly emotional arguments, both sides are using the same words to refer to different concepts. Would the debate be improved if everyone could agree on more precise language for words like "human," "person," and the like?

What about a human corpse? Still human, but not a person? What's the difference between a freshly-dead corpse and a human under general anesthesia? What if you rush the corpse to shock trauma and they resuscitate it? Do we have to get into questions of "potential" personhood?

And finally, isn't this whole thing just another form of the mind/body dichotomy? Is "human" the body and "person" the mind? Does your DNA make you human, but your brain makes you a person? But your DNA makes your brain, doesn't it? What about corporations -- they are persons, do they have minds? Do we need a new class for entities composed of more than one mind? (In Dance for the Ivory Madonna I riffed on the idea of the Superorganism as a multi-minded entity: there I posited that the Baby Boomers were an example of a Superorganism.)

I don't have answers to any of these questions...but they sure are fun to think about, aren't they?

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Avatar in 3D

noreply@blogger.com (Meerkatdon) — Sat, 02 Jan 2010 19:04:00 +0000

Last night we saw Avatar in 3D at the Cinemark Egyptian Theater at Arundel Mills Mall. Thomas was impressed. Don got motion sickness and had to leave the auditorium and go throw up.

I've found a lot of discussion online about the question of whether the stunning new 3D process used in Avatar is making people sick. The consensus seems to be that it's all hype, or that any momentary discomfort goes away when one gets accustomed to the process.

Not so.

I am easily subject ot motion sickness. I don't go on roller coasters or similar rides. reading in the car makes me queasy. After watching Avatar for about half an hour, I was sweating, had a headache, and felt sick to my stomach. I would have suspected low blood sugar, but I'd just had a meal. I tried taking the 3D glasses off and watching the movie without them, but that didn't make it any better. For a while I sat with my eyes closed, hoping the feeling would go away. But eventually I had to excuse myself and go to the rest room to vomit.

I sat on a bench outside the auditorium until the movie was over (it's 2 hours and 40 minutes long). My stomach wasn't settled; Thomas drove home and I went to bed.

Now, I have seen other 3D movie in theaters, and have never had any trouble before. None of them have been the "REAL D 3D" used in Avatar.

The theater staff was awesome in their complete disregard for my distress. After coming out of the rest room, I approached the nearest staffer and said, "Do many people get physically sick watching that movie?" The woman told me that she'd never heard of anyone getting sick, and she bustled off about her business. A little later, an official-looking guy in a suit walked by with a walkie-talkie blaring; I caught his eye and he said "Can I help you?"

I told him that I'd gotten sick watching Avatar in 3D. I said, "I've got a friend still in there, so I guess I'll sit here until it's over." He said, "Okay" and sauntered off.

Did anyone offer me a place to lie down (which I desperately needed)? No. Did anyone suggest a refund, or a comp ticket, or anything of the sort? No. Did anyone say "I'm sorry" or anything similar? No.

So here's what I've learned.

1. No more 3D movies.
2. No more Cinemark Egyptian Theater at Arundel Mills.
3. Next time, throw up in the middle of the hallway.

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Eurovan is Ill

noreply@blogger.com (Meerkatdon) — Tue, 22 Dec 2009 19:55:00 +0000

Notice the bent antenna.

...Yup, it's a van-aerial disease.

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Decades, Centuries, and Names (an extended rant)

noreply@blogger.com (Meerkatdon) — Mon, 21 Dec 2009 21:57:00 +0000

They're at it again. Time has a story about the search for a name for the decade of 2000-2009, and with 2010 bearing down upon us, we're going to be hearing from all the crazies. People who don't know the difference between cardinal and ordinal numbers, between decades and centuries, between names and nicknames.

Let's go over it again, slowly. And please remember that Don has a B.A. in Math.

Cardinal numbers are used to indicate quantity; they are the normal integers that we're used to: 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and so on infinitely.

Ordinal numbers are used to indicate order or sequence: First, second, third, fourth, fifth, and so on infinitely. Ordinal numbers are position: there is no "zeroth" or "negative-seventeenth."

All right then. Here's the rub. In the modern U.S. we generally refer to centuries (100-year periods) by ordinal numbers (i.e. "the 21st century"), and to decades (10-year periods) by cardinal numbers (i.e. "the 1990s").

You probably remember the heated arguments about the turn of the century. Some people thought the 21st century should start with the year 2000, others thought it should start with the year 2001. The 2001 folks were technically correct (all together now: "...which is the best kind of correct") because "the First century" started with the year 1 (there was no year 0) and finished at the end of 100, the "second century" started with 101 and continued thru 200, and (stay with me here) "the twenty-first century" started with the year 2001 and will continue thru 2100.

Note that the 2000 fanciers, while technically incorrect, were still off by only 1%. That's an astonishingly low error rate.

This, incidentally, is why we have the confusing pattern of calling years that start with 19xx "the twentieth century" and years that start with "20xx" "the twenty-first century."

(Here at Meerkat Meade we adopted an inclusive strategy: we decided to phase in the 21st century during the whole year 2000. We figure that turning a century is a lot harder than turning an oil tanker, and they take miles and miles to turn. For us, the century started turning on Jan 1 2000 and was finished by January 1, 2001.)

Of course, 1999/2000/2001 was also a change of millennium. We don't have a standard way of referring to millennia. Sometimes we call this current one "the third millennium" (ordinal) and sometimes we call it "the 2000s" (cardinal.) To be technically correct, "the third millennium" started on 2001 and runs thru 3000. while "the 2000s" started in 2000 and run through 2099.

(Actually, at Meerkat Meade we prefer to use the Holocene calendar, which sets the year 0 at the start of the Holocene period in the year 10,000 BCE. This year is 12,009 H.E. [Holocene Epoch], and we are in the 13th millennium or the 121st century, both of which started on January 1, 12,000.)

Now let's talk about decades.

As I said above, we generally name decades cardinally: the 1950s, the '70s, etc. Only in flowery, stilted, or overly legal language do we say something like "the third decade of the twentieth century" (ordinal) rather than "the 1920s" (cardinal). Thus, the 1970s started with 1970 and ran thru 1979, the 1980s ran 1980-1989, etc.

Problem is, people who don't think about what they're saying (and they are legion) remember the technically correct argument that "centuries start with the 01 year because there was no year 0" and apply it (incorrectly) to decades and millennia.

For example, the following letter from a very stupid child appeared in the December 21, 2009 issue of Time:

Even 5-year-olds know that when counting anything -- toes, fingers, or years -- we begin with one, not zero. The first decade of this millennium began with the year 2001, and the last year of the first decade of this millennium will be next year, 2010. The millennium began with the year 2001. Why is this so difficult for adults to grasp? -Anna Link, Falls Church, VA

Because, Anna, adults do not generally refer to decades in the same stilted, pretentious way that you do. Nor, to be technically correct, did the article you're commenting upon: The '00s: Goodbye (at Last) to the Decade from Hell. Even 5-year-olds (to borrow a phrase) know that "the '00s" began in '00 (duh) and end in '09.

And to point out your technically incorrectness (the worst kind of incorrectness), since "this millennium" started (cardinally) in 2000, the "first decade of this millennium" ran from 2000 thru 2009 -- not 2001-2010 as you say. Too bad, Anna. If you'd only been pedantic enough to say "the first decade of the third millennium," you'd at least have been partially correct...instead of revealing yourself to the nation as a dunderhead who cannot tell the difference between 10 years, 100 years, and 1,000 years.

Oh, well, you were educated in Virginia, so perhaps expecting you to have knowledge of numbers greater than 4 is asking too much. Go back to your nonevolutionary world created in 4004 BCE (wouldn't that make today part of "the eighth millennium" which runs from 1998 thru 2097? The "second decade" of that millennium, in fact, which started in 2007 and runs though 2018?)

Ahem. The point is, in general civic society we count decades cardinally. The current decade is 2000-2009, and it doesn't have a name.

That's because there isn't a common accepted name for the span of numbers 0-9. 10-10 are "the teens," 20-29 are "the twenties," and so forth -- and that's how we commonly name decades: either "the 1910s," "the 1920s," etc. or "the Teens," "the Twenties," etc.

If we try to call 2000-2009 "the 2000s," there is going to be confusion. Does that mean the decade, or the century? (We frequently do refer to centuries in ordinal fashion, as in "the 1600s" or "the 1800s.")

But there's no name like "teens, twenties, etc." for '00-'09.

Last time we faced this problem was with the 1900s. At the time, there was a generally accepted name for '01-'09: aughts. This came from the standard way of speaking numbers aloud at the time: 1807 was pronounced "eighteen-aught-seven." As people in the 1910s and 1920s started to talk about years in the period 1900-1909, it was natural that they said things like "Back in aught-four..." or "The bad storm of aught-eight." From there it was a simple generalization to call the decade "the aughts."

Nowadays, this is not the fashion. We say "eighteen-oh-seven" and "Back in oh-six..." So by analogy, we should be calling this decade "the oh's." But that's not going to stick, because there is too much potential for confusion. (In Baltimore, for example, "the O's" means "the Orioles.")

I say we should go with "aughts." And we should go back to the old way: "Back in twenty-aught-four..."

Just to make things more complicated (cue Grover: "More complicated?!"), we also talk about "naming decades" when we really mean giving a decade a nickname. These are cute sobriquets like "the Roaring Twenties" or "the Me Decade." Not every decade gets a nickname (what nickname did we give the 1910s?), and moreover, nicknames are often applied well after the fact. If the decade 2000-2009 is going to have a nickname, it's too early for us to decide on it now.

And one more thing, while I've got you here. The time is long past to drop the "two thousand" thing. Next year is not "two thousand ten" (or even worse, "two thousand and ten") -- it's "twenty-ten." 1910 wasn't "one thousand nine hundred ten," it is and always was "nineteen-ten."

We put up with this nonsense the first few years of the century (it certainly made sense to say "the year two thousand" rather than "the year twenty-oh-oh"), but we realized the problem back when everyone was calling that movie "Two Thousand and One: A Space Odyssey," and even pushed for calling the sequel "Twenty-Ten." We totally stopped being patient around 2003 (twenty-oh-three).

If nothing else, imagine the time savings from 7 billion people saying "twenty-fifteen" instead of "two thousand fifteen."

Thank you. Now go forth and celebrate the ending of the '00s, and best wishes for a safe and happy 2010 and the rest of the Teens..

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The Blizzard of 2009

noreply@blogger.com (Meerkatdon) — Sat, 19 Dec 2009 23:37:00 +0000

It's blizzard time here at Meerkat Meade. We are snowed in, but there was plenty of warning and we laid in lots of supplies. In fact, we're more prepared for a five-day blizzard, rather than the weekend that this one will probably take up.

On the other hand, it's 6:30 pm, there are 14 inches of snow outside the back door, and it's still falling.

In any case, our tea cabinet is well-stocked, so we're happy.

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Supernova Amanda

noreply@blogger.com (Meerkatdon) — Wed, 02 Dec 2009 02:32:00 +0000

(by Don Sakers)

Our dear friend Amanda Allen (29 June 1958 - 23 May 2008) died a year and a half ago. Here is something that I wrote for her memorial service.

Supernova Amanda
Richard Bach said, “The bond that links your true family is not one of blood, but of respect and joy in each other's life. Rarely do members of one family grow up under the same roof.” Amanda loved that quote, and she knew that we here today were her true family. Amanda had a mundane family and a mundane life, and I mean no disrespect for those -- but like most of us, Amanda’s real life was here, among fans and fandom.

I was privileged to know Amanda more closely than many. For 23 years we shared that “respect and joy in each other’s life.” In a special way, Amanda gave me her life, when she allowed me to turn her into Miranda Maris in Dance for the Ivory Madonna.

The mundane world doesn’t have the words to articulate what Amanda was to me. “Friend,” “Companion,” “Colleague,” Mate,” “Partner,” “Counselor” -- all inadequate, inaccurate, misleading. . The language of sf and fantasy, at least, offers more possibilities: Amanda and I were bredin, droogs, imzadi, water brothers. About the best I can do in Mundane language is to say I’ve lost a sister.

Let me tell you about my sister Amanda.

Amanda was an artist. She lived and breathed creativity, in so many different formats. We all know her costumes, her superb sense of visual composition and decoration; she also wrote, drew, and sang. In Amanda’s hands, the cooking of a meal became a major artistic endeavor. She was an accomplished storyteller.

Amanda had a deep, abiding joy in life. Even when things weren’t going as well as she wanted, she found ways to celebrate and enjoy. When I look back on two decades with Amanda, what I recall most is laughter…the kind of laughter that comes from deep in the soul and rejuvenates the spirit.

Above all, Amanda loved to share her gifts and her joy with others. With her friends, with the generations of kids she cared for…but also, in true fannish fashion, with newcomers and novices. For Amanda, there truly were no strangers – only friends she hadn’t met. If you want an archetypal image of Amanda, imagine her sweeping through the halls in one of her stunning Tudor ensembles, taking the time to stop and sincerely praise the costuming effort of a teenager with a badly-cut tunic and a bedsheet thrown across her shoulders as a cape.

Astronomers tell us that stars come in different types. The ordinary stars burn days after day for billions of years, giving heat & light to the universe. Then there are novas, stars that shine hotter and more brightly. And every so often there is a supernova: a single star that, for a time, outshines the entire galaxy. Amanda was a supernova. She shed her warmth and light across our part of the universe, and though her period was too brief, it was a stunning and beautiful time for all of us who beheld her.

In supernovas, ordinary hydrogen and helium fuse into heavier, exotic elements; then in passing, the supernova spreads these elements across the skies to enrich the universe. All that we know – our Earth, our air, our bodies themselves – are gifts from long-ago supernovas. Similarly, Amanda spread her gifts far and wide, and we will be seeing their effects as long as we live.

One last thing about supernovas: when they are gone, the nebulas they leave behind are among the most stunningly beautiful objects in the sky. And this is true of Supernova Amanda: what she leaves in her place, most of all, is incredible, ineffable beauty.

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Doctor Who: Who's Your Favorite Doctor?

noreply@blogger.com (Meerkatdon) — Sun, 22 Nov 2009 17:56:00 +0000

Being highly intelligent, imaginative people, we of course love Doctor Who. And we've been fans of The Doctor since childhood, not like all those Johnny-come-latelies who discovered Doctor Who in 2005. We have just about every existing Doctor Who episode on DVD, having recorded them over long years watching the show on Maryland Public Television (and later, BBC America and the Sci-Fi Channel).

Since the show began in 1963, ten actors have played The Doctor. (One of the things that makes the show true genius is how they figured out a plausible way to replace the main character with a different actor when William Hartnell left in 1966.) Among Doctor Who fans, the favorite question is "Who's your favorite Doctor?"

Over the years, we've observed that for most people, their favorite Doctor is the one they were first exposed to.

For instance, Thomas's first exposure to Doctor Who was during the John Pertwee years, and Pertwee (left) is his favorite Doctor.

With Don, things are a little different. His first Doctor was Tom Baker, and he will always have an attachment to that Doctor. But he realized a long time ago that he's a very fickle fan. For Don, the answer to "Who's your favorite Doctor?" is: Whichever one I've seen most recently.

Given all this, perhaps the most useful question is "Who's your second-favorite Doctor? "Right now, Thomas is leaning toward William Hartnell, while Don says Sylvester McCoy. But those answers might change.

So how about it? Who's your second-favorite Doctor?

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Energy, Global Warming, and Science Fiction

noreply@blogger.com (Meerkatdon) — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 14:33:00 +0000

In present-day science fiction, you don't read much about energy, global warming, and associated problems. Why?

Because science fiction writers, readers, and fans thrashed everything out three decades ago, figured out the most workable solutions, and moved on.

Around 1973 the big buzzword in science fiction was "the hydrogen economy." The idea was that we should move beyond a petroleum-based economy to one based on hydrogen. Hydrogen burns cleanly; the only waste product is water.

In order to obtain hydrogen, we would need electricity. Ultimately, that electricity would come from controlled fusion. But fusion wasn't (and still isn't) practical. We would need something to tide us over until we perfected fusion.

The perfect medium-term solution was (and still is) space-based solar power stations, which would beam power to Earth via microwaves. In the mid-1970s Gerard K. O'Neill and his team laid out a workable roadmap to building these power stations.

Until solar power stations were widely available, we would have to get our electricity from a variety of sources: renewables such as wind, ground-based solar, tidal, geothermal, and ocean temperature differential...but mainly nuclear fission, because the energy available from all the others was only a fraction of the total we'd need. As quickly as possible we would eliminate the burning of fossil fuels -- first, because of the emission of greenhouse gases and other nasty stuff, second because they were limited, and third because petroleum and other fossil fuel components are too essential chemicals to many of our industrial processes to go around burning up the limited supply we have.

Now, science fiction circa 1979 was willing to admit that all of this didn't solve the global warming problem for all time. Sure, it took care of greenhouse gases, but all energy use results in waste heat, and sooner or later an expanding energy-intensive civilization would be generating enough waste heat to make Earth uncomfortable. Sure, it would take thousands of years to reach that point, but science fiction thinks in terms of millennia.

So in addition to all the other solutions, sf proposed that we work on long-term ways to mitigate warming...the longest-term of all being methods to move Earth further out from the sun as necessary. (Eventually it would be necessary to move Earth anyway, if not in the next million years because of increased energy use, then in several billion when the sun moves into its red giant phase).

There you have it. Now suppose the world had listened to science fiction back in the 1970s. Today we would have a global hydrogen economy fueled by limitless space-based solar power and we'd be starting to decommission no-longer-necessary fission plants.

Now here's the real meat of the matter: What is science fiction saying today, that people 30 years from now will wish they had listened to?

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GCFCG Haunted House 2009

noreply@blogger.com (Meerkatdon) — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 00:00:00 +0000

(This is basically a copy of what I posted on the AACPL Programming Blog. That's a closed blog, so I figured I would post here in the open as well. -Don)

[ADDED LATER: I apologize for not giving credit to the photographers. I fixed it.]

(photo by Meg Miller)
If you thought you heard screams coming from the north on Halloween afternoon, you're not mistaken. Between 1pm and 5 pm, a total of 202 people (138 kids and 63 adults) started through our Haunted House (presented in conjunction with the Greater Columbia Fantasy Costumers Guild, pictured above). Staffers Meg Miller and Leslie Shepley kept the crowd under control and the groups moving through, while Guild members (including staffer Don Sakers) provided the scares.

(photo by Don Sakers)

At the entrance, groups were met by one of the two maids, Holly and June (left). The maid explained that the Count and Countess from Transylvania were considering moving their family to the United States. The Brooklyn Park Library was allowing the family to live in the basement for a while, and today we were giving tours so that the family could meet Americans. "So be on your best behavior...remember, we are going into someone's house. Keep your hands to yourselves, be polite, and don't break anything. And oh, by the way, they're vampires."

(At this point, some kids lost their nerve and bailed out.)

(photo posted on Yahoo by Don Sakers)
Groups first greeted the Dowager Countess (right), who was quite mad. It was at this point that a latecomer joined the group, a teenage girl who had missed her turn earlier. Everyone said hello to the Dowager, then moved along down the hall. (Sharp-eyed visitors got a glimpse of a ghostly figure wafting down the hall, which added to their unease.)

(photo by Gwyn Fireman)
Down the hall, Uncle Pesci (left) stepped out from the bathroom wearing a shower cap and clutching a shower brush. He grumbled at the maid because no one had told him it was tour day. We'd intended this to be a minor and slightly humorous startle-scare, but some kids screamed, others started crying, and at least one little boy let loose his bladder and had to be escorted out by Mom.

After this encounter with Uncle Pesci, the group continued on toward the kitchen.

(photo taken by Greg Sears on camera owned by Gwyn Fireman)
The kitchen staff (above) were glad to welcome each group and show off some of the delicacies they were preparing for the family: kitty eyeballs, ear & eyeball stew, assorted sweetmeats sauteed in puppy drool, and fresh intestines ("It's an acquired taste").

The kitchen staff then asked some questions ("Are you healthy?" "Can I smell your hands?") and then nodded approvingly over one member of the group. Without warning, they grabbed her away and pulled her (kicking and screaming) through the door. After the door slammed, the poor victim's cries were abruptly cut off by a very solid "thunk." (The victim, of course, was the teenager who joined the group at the last minute -- in reality she was a shill who belonged to the Costumers Guild.)

(photo by Gwyn Fireman)
At this point the group was joined by the family butler, Mr. Renfield (right), who announced that "The Family is ready to receive guests now." Mr. Renfield led them through a curtain to the family room, while behind them the maid tried to reassure those who were concerned about the missing teenager: "No, no, there's nothing we can do for her. Did anyone know her? Oh, good, she won't be missed."

With Mr. Renfield in the lead (with a deadpan delivery remisicent of Riff-Raff from The Rocky Horror Picture Show), groups moved on to meet various members of the family.

(photo by Gwyn Fireman)
Sisters Malice and Alice (above) were the first to greet the guests. Mr. Renfield explained that Malice has been lost in a horror novel for the last two hundred years, while Alice enjoys playing with her dolls. Every time Alice stuck her doll with a pin, Malice would jump and say "Ouch." Mr. Renfield cautioned visitors not to give Alice anything personal, such as a key, some hair, or a finger.
(photo by Gwyn Fireman)
Great-Aunt Elspeth (right), a spinster, was spinning cobwebs...but she always found at least one person in the group with lovely hair, and she asked them if she could have their head ("to keep the hair fresh.") When Mr. Renfield said, "Now Elspeth, you know that you never give the heads back," Elspeth countered with, "They never ask!" Unanswerable logic.

(photo by Gwyn Fireman)
Cousin Charlotte (above) was next on the tour. First Charlotte used her Tarot cards to peel back the mists of time and tell the fortune of someone in the group: "Death." Mr. Renfield deadpanned, "Very perceptive, Charlotte. Everyone's fortune is death...eventually. Why don't you show them something more...mystical?"

Charlotte then conjured up the spirit of someone from a previous tour; the ghostly apparition arose and silently swayed in the breeze.

(photo by Gwyn Fireman)
Now it was time to meet the Count and Countess (above). Both welcomed their visitors enthusiastically. The Count asked one of the children his/her name. Let's follow one little boy, clinging to Mom, who answered, "Daniel." The Count patted the maid on her shoulder and said, "You have served us well. Tell Cook that the first course on tonight's dinner will be...Daniel." He looked around the group. "And the rest of them can go in the soup pot; we'll feast on them all weekend."

At this point, young Daniel started to lose it. Mom patted him comfortingly and said, "Honey, it's just make-believe. They're not really going to take you and eat you." With fear-filled eyes, Daniel protested, "They took that other girl!"

Mom had no ready reply.

Fortunatley for the group, Mr. Renfield stepped forward and said to the Count, "Wait a minute, that's not the deal! You said you'd only take one from each group." The maid answered, "We're renegotiating the deal. We're taking them all, and I get my immortality." The Count pointed at Mr. Renfield and cackled, "Yes, and you get nothing...except the soup pot with the rest of them."

Mr. Renfield stood firm. "You forget, there are three things that vampires have no power over. One: your own reflection in a mirror."

The Countess sneered, "There are no mirrors here."

Mr. Renfield said, "Two: the burning touch of sunlight!"

The Count cackled, "We are in the basement. There's no sulight here, you fool!"

Mr. Renfield continued, "Three: the Vampire Hunter Blake!"

(photo by Gwyn Fireman)
In burst Vampire Hunter Blake (right), who instantly drove a stake through the heart of the traitorous maid. As he struggled with the vampire family, Mr. Renfield ushered the group through a doorway to the graveyard. Blake stepped through, then threw a shining rope across the threshhold. "We're safe, they can't cross this magical barrier."

As Blake and Renfield organized the group, the Countess burst through the barrier. "I am the oldest and strongest of this family, no barrier can stop me. First I will have you, Blake, and then I will take the rest!" She and Blake fought to the death (Blake's) while Renfield sheparded the group into the exit antechamber. There, with the safety of sunlight on the other side of the door, he paused to make sure everyone was accounted for ("Wait, we're missing one...oh, never mind.")

The Countess burst through the door, and the group ran screaming into the safety of the light.

----------

This fifth annual Haunted House was our most successful. We had two pants-wetters, one hysterical crier who had to leave halfway through (and then was forced back in by Mother, perhaps not the best example of quality parenting), one puppy pile (in which most of the group fell to the floor and tried to crawl to safety, kicking the last one in line back toward the vampires), at least half a dozen older siblings offering younger brothers or sisters as sacrificial victims, and a good number of screamers, criers, and general scared-to-deathers. One group froze completely when Blake entered, and were only convinced to move to safety when Uncle Pesci stood up behind them and roared.

In short, a grand time was had by all.

Setup took about six hours on Friday afternoon/evening (about 4-10 pm) and teardown was accomplished in less time on Sunday (1-4 pm). And the Guild is already thrashing out ideas for next year.

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VHS-to-DVD Project Update

noreply@blogger.com (Meerkatdon) — Sat, 10 Oct 2009 15:17:00 +0000

As you may recall, in June 2004 we started converting our collection of over 1,500 VHS tapes to DVD. It's long past time for an update.

Despite a lapse of a couple years due to illness, we are back on track and into the home stretch. Just moments ago Don put DVD number 1924 into the recorder to transfer tape G:088. Out of the original tapes, we are down to about 150 (which means we're just about 90% done, which is an encouraging thought.) We're currently transferring stuff that was recorded in mid-1995, 14 years ago.

The most recent tape we transferred contained the following:

Our video catalog has undergone another transformation: it is now in HanDBase format, on the Macs and on Don's iPhone. Having the video database on iPhone is a leap forward in covnenience.

So what comes next? If we keep up our current rate, the conversion project should be completed by June 2010 -- six years after we began. We estimate that by that time we'll be beyond DVD 2200.

Once we're done, we look forward to the next step: ripping all these DVDs into something like iTunes. We're going to have to be patient: storing the equivalent of 2200 DVDs would take something in excess of 10 TB. But eventually we'll see iPods with a capacity of 16 TB; by that time we will be able to carry our entire video collection in our pockets. It's a nifty prospect.

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Long ago the four nations lived in harmony....

noreply@blogger.com (Meerkatdon) — Sun, 06 Sep 2009 01:30:00 +0000

Welcome Orion

noreply@blogger.com (Meerkatdon) — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 14:40:00 +0000

We have a name for the new hamster: Orion.

You see, he has these three spots on his back: two small ones close together, and a larger one a little ways away, all along the same line. So we were thinking of calling him "Umlaut" (for the two spots) or "Ellipsis" (for all three). Then on the way home from work yesterday, I came up with "Orion" from the constellation, and that did it.

So our new guy is officially Orion, a stellar hamster who is destined to be a mighty hunter.

If he holds still long enough, I will try to post a picture of his three spots.

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The New Hanster

noreply@blogger.com (Meerkatdon) — Wed, 02 Sep 2009 00:03:00 +0000

It's New Hamster Time

noreply@blogger.com (Meerkatdon) — Mon, 31 Aug 2009 23:42:00 +0000

If all goes well, tomorrow evening we will be getting a new hamster.

The Great Hall and Basement are cleaned and prepared with fresh nesting material. We have a good supply of hamster food. And our poison ivy, which dissuaded us from getting a hamster last week, is faded to almost nothing -- certainly no risk to a little baby hamster.

Will post here and on Twitter with the news.

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Monday's Child R.I.P.

noreply@blogger.com (Meerkatdon) — Tue, 14 Jul 2009 02:03:00 +0000

Should have posted this a while ago, in remembrance.

Monday's child is Farrah Fawcett,
Tuesday's child is Fuller Brush Man,
Wednesday's child is Martin Balsam,
Thursday's child is Tommy Newsome,
Friday's child is Euell Gibbons,
Saturday's child is Richard Simmons,
But the child that's born on the sabbath day
Is John and Paul and George and Jay.

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Act Well Your Part Now Available for Kindle

noreply@blogger.com (Meerkatdon) — Sat, 11 Jul 2009 16:14:00 +0000

Don's first novel, Act Well Your Part, is now available in Amazon Kindle format for $3.50.

Act Well Your Part is the story of Keith Graff, who dislikes his new school, Oak Grove High. He misses his old friends, and despairs of ever fitting in. Then he joins the school's drama club, where he meets the boyishly cute Bran Davenport. From there on it's a rollicking good boy-meets-boy story.

Since its original publication in 1986, Act Well Your Part has become a classic, an unabashed love story set not in the world that was, but in the world as, perhaps, it should be. It is a world in which sexual orientation matters about as much as eye color of left-handedness.

Amazon Kindle format is an electronic text format that can be viewed on Amazon's Kindle device and Apple's iPhone.

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Help Spread the Word

noreply@blogger.com (Meerkatdon) — Sat, 27 Jun 2009 23:23:00 +0000

Folks, please help me spread the word that a thinly-disguised Michael Jackson was a character in Dance for the Ivory Madonna. I think lots of people would be interested to see Michael Jackson in a science fiction novel.

The link is tinyurl.com/mjsfnovel

Thanks!

-Don Sakers

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Reviewing the Star Trek Movies

noreply@blogger.com (Meerkatdon) — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 02:28:00 +0000

Everyone is asking what we thought of the new Star Trek movie. Before answering that, you should know what we thought of the others.

First, a few words on how we review movies:

To begin with, we rate movies along two axes. One is good/bad; the other is fun/not-fun. A movie can be good and fun (The Princess Bride), good and not fun (Das Boot), bad but fun (Independence Day), or bad and not fun (Ernest Goes to Camp). In addition, we sometimes rate movies on a scale of 1 to 101 Dalmatians (the animated one, of course).

That being said, here are our opinions of the various Star Trek movies.

----------

#1: Star Trek: The Motion Picture

Very good, pretty fun

A good science fiction movie, although not necessarily good Star Trek. Maybe 85 dalmatians.

----------

#2: The Wrath of Khan

Pretty good, very fun.

Although we still want to know where they got enough mass to form a planet in the middle of that nebula. Maybe 80-85 dalmatians.

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#3: The Search for Spock

Pretty good, very fun.

Very hard to separate from Wrath of Khan - they're really 2 parts of the same movie, aren't they? Maybe 70-75 dalmatians.

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#4: The Voyage Home

Bad, somewhat fun.

Time travel is not Star Trek's forte. And why did the whale tank have to be transparent? Maybe 50-55 dalmatians.

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#5: The Final Frontier

Bad, not much fun.

Maybe 50-55 dalmatians.

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#6: The Undscovered Country

Very bad, not much fun.

Okay, guys, which ship was doing the gas surveys? Maybe 30-35 dalmatians.

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#7: Generations

Not too bad, somewhat fun.

Crashing the saucer section was fun. But time travel again...oh my. Maybe 50-60 dalmatians.

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#8: First Contact

Not too good, somewhat fun.

Impossible to reconcile this version of Zefram Cochrane with the one seen in the series. And...oh dear...time travel and the Borg? Really? Maybe 60-65 dalmatians.

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#9: Insurrection

Quite good, quite fun.

Good sf, good Trek, a cool planet and a plot that makes sense. Maybe as many as 80-85 dalmatians.

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#10: Nemesis

Very bad, not much fun.

Proof that Star Trek can be awful without time travel or the Borg. Maybe 30-35 dalmatians, maybe fewer.

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#11 Star Trek.

Not that good but really fun.

Lots of nods to fans, some really good actors. But necessary to give up trying to piece together the sloppy narrative. Head off to save Vulcan with only two real officers and a bunch of third-year cadets on the Federation Flagship? Really? Make a third-year cadet who is on probation the First Officer? Did I mention it's the Flagship? Promote that cadet to Flagship Captain, over the heads of all the existing officers? Sure, why not?

Maybe 75-80 dalmatians?

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Soured on Apple

noreply@blogger.com (Meerkatdon) — Mon, 15 Jun 2009 00:32:00 +0000

I am well and truly pissed at Apple.

It all started on June 7 with Security Update 2009-02. I installed it on our venerable seven-year-old iMac G4 (running OSX 10.4.11). Afterwards, the iMac wouldn't start up. It froze on the blue startup screen. What's worse, it would not boot into so-called "safe mode."

I looked online and found that I was not the only person bitten by this bug. There were many suggestions, so I started trying them. Start up in single-user mode (which it did) and repair the startup disc, repair permissions, change the name of various preferences files, delete this-that-and-another file from various Libraries. No dice.

I finally learned the trick of opening the DVD drive, so was able to boot from the install disc. Fromt there, I was able to boot into OS9. But that did me no good.

One source said to boot from an external Firewire drive. So I used the install DVD to install OSX 10.4.6 on the external drive, and tried to boot from that.

No luck. Under OS9 it mounted the external drive without trouble; but it would not boot from that drive no matter what I did.

Eventually, I had no other choice but to reinstall the OS. I was reluctant to do this, because I had to do it back in February (after another botched Security Update) and the update destroyed a bunch of settings, as well as wiping out all our iTunes playlists. But there was no other choice.

So I installed OSX 10.4.6 on the iMac. And it rebooted successfully, hooray!

But...

The wireless card is messed up. System Profiler sees the card, but the iMac insists that it is not installed. The ethernet port is messed up -- the system doesn't even admit that it has an Ethernet port, and it certainly won't go online. (Both the wireless network and the ethernet connection work fine on the laptop.)

Worse, the iMac won't mount the external drive. Nor will with external drive mount on the laptop. That drive holds all our iTunes, all our iPhotos, and a bunch of other stuff that I really don't want to lose.

Without being able to go online, I can't install any system updates. I am afraid to run anything because I don't want to have OS conflicts.

Thanks a lot, Apple. You've turned a perfectly-good computer into a wreck.

I'd been planning to buy a brand-new iMac with tax refund money...but now I am very reluctant. I've recommended Apple to many friends over the last few years...but I can't do that in any good conscience any longer. I am definitely soured on Apple.

----------

Update 9:08 PM: Well, I can still boot into OS 9.2...and then the iMac recognizes its wireless connection. So we can get online using a ten-year-old version of Internet Explorer. Bah.

Apple still sucks big-time.

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CostumeCon 27 Pictures

noreply@blogger.com (Meerkatdon) — Tue, 05 May 2009 01:19:00 +0000

Our CostumeCon 27 presentation was "CostumeCon 1889: Steampunk Style." In it, we did a masquerade-within-the-masquerade, in Steampunk style, which spoofed all the standard cliches of costuming: Star Trek, Harry Potter, Star Wars, Lord of the Rings, and five different Snow Queens. Not only did we get a group award for workmanship and the "Best Concept" masquerade award...but the New York/New Jersey Costumer's Guild awarded us the coveted Spazzy Award, given for the most sick and twisted presentation.

Here's the group picture:

And here's Thomas as Darth Vader. His helmet is made of folded and glued cardboard.

And here is the last costume we presented, Don as the ultimate Snow Queen: a steampunk drag queen cocaine dealer (Snow Queen, get it?)

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