Journal Title

Woo, drivin'!

Wed, 24 Jun 2009 05:55:51 GMT

Damn, today was awesome. I drove up to Clearlake with my roommate, and along the way there was a pretty impressive brush fire on the side of the road. We got pretty close to it, and saw the flames.

I took highway 175 from Hopland up to the lake, and I kinda don't want to take that stretch again any time soon. Very, very narrow, and very, very windy. In fact, one of the worst mountain roads I've ever seen, and I used to live in the mountains! Made it though, and the lake was huge, and beautiful.

We stopped for Chinese at a decent little place in Lakeport called Chopsticks (nothing special, but definitely not bad) and then I drove around the lake and back down through Napa County, and forgot to get off the highway in Calistoga. Ended up in Napa, where I decided to take the main drag west because it'd probably hit a road that goes over the mountains eventually. I turned off on Redwood Rd because it sounded feasible.

It was after sunset, and dark, and the road was surrounded by trees and unlit. It was absolutely beautiful; as I mentioned to my roommate, the only thing that could have improved it would have been dim, multicolored paper lanterns in the trees along the roadside. Eventually, through much windy, dark, hilly road, I ended up on Dry Creek Rd, took it left and back up the mountain (d'oh!) then down what I think was Trinity Rd through yet more twists and turns. (Gave my car's 1st gear a good workout!)

On the way down, we got to see something absolutely awe-inspiring: Santa Rosa, from the mountain, with a red haze (probably from the fire I mentioned earlier) and a tiny sliver of a crescent moon over the valley. It was like something out of a painting, and I wish I could've gotten a photo of it. (No tripod. D'oh!)

Finally by sheer luck, we got to Sonoma Highway and took it back home via Kenwood. Turns out I didn't miss anything worthwhile in the woot-off, too! Bonus!

Mon, 22 Jun 2009 22:39:39 GMT

Sun, 31 May 2009 21:21:08 GMT

Don't know how long it's gonna last, but right now Amazon's selling HDMI cables for 23 cents each and Toslink cables for 8 cents each! EDIT: plus somewhat high shipping, but still a much better deal than you're likely to find elsewhere. (Up to 3 on the HDMI cables, not sure what the limit on the Toslinks are, I got 5.)

Fri, 29 May 2009 09:33:54 GMT

Pixar's latest, "Up", is another masterpiece. They've still got it, and it's still beautiful. Touching, hilarious, and nostalgic in a good way.

FA users!

Wed, 06 May 2009 20:51:04 GMT

If you want to get rid of the annoying as hell "Update, random mode" button:

This should work for all mozilla browsers (Seamonkey, Firefox, Camino, Flock, etc.) and for Safari and Opera, too.

First off, if you're unfamiliar with editing the userContent.css file, google it with your browser name to find out where your browser's configs (If you're using Camino, for example, they're in ~/Library/Application Support/Camino )are located and if a userContent.css file is not already there, create one.

Insert this block into the file, and save it:

@-moz-document domain(furaffinity.net)
{
    input[name="random_mode"] {
        width: 4px !important;
    }
}

Note: if you want to get rid of it completely, change "width: 4px !important;" to "display: none !important;"

My mind is blown.

Fri, 17 Apr 2009 10:37:27 GMT

In Australian stock car racing, they turn right.

Mar-i-nate!

Wed, 08 Apr 2009 22:29:16 GMT

I got me one of these vacuum marinaters in the last woot-off for $30, and I was fully expecting it to be snake oil, but it actually works! I made some poke yesterday in it, and 10 minutes (two full cycles) in it did a better job of marinating it than leaving it overnight in the fridge and stirring every few hours or so. It not only got the sauce throughout the fish fully, it also tenderized it noticeably, which made it that much better, IMO. I'd not say it's worth the list price, but if you can score one for around $30 like I did, it's a nice piece of kitchen equipment.

Wed, 08 Apr 2009 21:38:21 GMT

Is it just me, or does cane sugar soda go flat a lot more slowly than HFCS soda? I left a bottle of Boylan Grape out overnight, and it doesn't even seem to have lost enough carbonation to be noticeably different.

Epic fail!

Wed, 01 Apr 2009 02:01:28 GMT

Edit: I guess Bug Me Not is in Europe, where it's already April first.

Important! To anyone who shops at Whole Foods

Wed, 18 Mar 2009 06:37:09 GMT

Just in case you haven't seen it, this article shows some of the many ways they're anticompetitive bastards.

Wed, 11 Mar 2009 03:41:50 GMT

Some day, I'm going to go back in time, find out who proposed actually implementing DST, and make sure they're never on-time or fully-rested again.

Sun, 08 Mar 2009 13:47:33 GMT

Some day, I want to wake up in a world where all the anthropocentrists, Objectivists, and demagogues are gone, and humanity has accepted its place in the universe: as part of it, rather than the masters of it.

Mon, 23 Feb 2009 05:03:49 GMT

Holy crap. At first, today's Subnormality strip had me thinking "oh shit, wall of text!"

But then I bothered to read it, and it's... stunning in its portrayal of a valuable message. Please give it a look, if you haven't already.

Wed, 18 Feb 2009 06:26:02 GMT

Woo, I finally made a movie for the YouTube!

Sat, 14 Feb 2009 23:52:56 GMT

Happy "Remind Single People How Much Their Life Sucks" Day, everyone!

Sat, 14 Feb 2009 00:31:14 GMT

Although it makes Longcat jealous, Lawrence of Arabia really is the damn fine movie people say it is.

Tue, 10 Feb 2009 07:43:44 GMT

Fuck today.

Mon, 09 Feb 2009 23:25:07 GMT

You want to know why people hate furries? Because even amongst themselves, furries can't fucking keep from being retarded.

On a related note, I apologize for ever expressing positive views of Sage Nadia. I got myself banned from FChan for daring to call her on her bullshit bigotry and misunderstanding of how modern "democracy" works. To pour more gasoline on the fire, throughout the entire thread she was not using her admin login, but making vague, immature "I'm an admin semi-incognito" statements that led me to the conclusion that either Nadia is childish and prone to power-trips, or someone was impersonating her. I'd hoped it was the latter, because the last thing I needed was yet another furry site admin to hate, but I was mistaken.

By the way, for any who hadn't already concluded this, I can confirm it: FChan banned cub because Nadia hates it. The reasoning they give on the site is a made-up copout.

Fucking furries. Why are so many furries so fucking messed up? (I include myself in that, not going to lie.) I'm not just seeing normal human behavior in action. Sure, this sort of thing happens all the time amongst normal people, but it's nowhere near as prevalent in any given group as it is in furry. It seems like a requisite for being a prominent member of the "furry community" is being an attention-whoring douchebag.

Edit: Oh yeah, to add insult to injury, the bigoted fuckwad who keeps inserting "FUCK YOU" over and over into his posts and throwing out personal-attacks left and right is still posting unfettered in that thread, because Nadia agrees with him. Fucking bullshit.

Need help!

Thu, 29 Jan 2009 07:43:57 GMT

For any of you still reading this thing, I have a pretty major problem right now. I'm taking calculus, and due to some problems with registering classes, It's the only class I've got this semester. Also, I _need_ it if I want to major in meteorology; as much as I love anthropology, meteorology has always been my favorite subject, and if I take calculus, it's within reach, and it's somewhat more practical (read: I can actually get a decent job with a background in it) than anthropology.

My problem is this: My instructor's approach to homework is driving me insane. To sum it up, homework in his class serves the purpose of providing me with a little practice, and lowering my grade, mainly due to these incredibly annoying Problem of the Week assignments, in which I have to do some incredibly ugly problem that takes several hours and several pages, and I can't get any real help out of him. Homework is 10% of the grade in the class, so I can almost assuredly get a B in the class even if I don't bother doing the occasional irritating Problem of the Week.

I'm having no trouble at all absorbing the material, and the actual homework from the textbook is not really a problem, but these damned Problem of the Week things are killing me, because they entail using a lot of "clever math tricks" to solve, some of which I either never learned, or learned so long ago and used so infrequently that I've long since forgotten them.

Basically, in a nutshell, this is only one of several reasons I'm not exactly thrilled with my calculus class. The subject itself is great, and I know I could do well with the right instruction, but this isn't it. That said...

Should I slog through it and likely get a B, or drop it and focus on my current major, and maybe go back later to try and get degree in meteorology in addition to an anthro degree? I don't need to be in JC any more, I have all of the transfer requirements for entering a uni or college as a junior complete, I just don't want to pigeonhole myself into a liberal arts major.

Wed, 28 Jan 2009 12:42:06 GMT

Okay, I confess: I actually like Coldplay.

Shut up.

Wed, 28 Jan 2009 04:48:06 GMT

Oy, Microsoft. I would be willing to actually pay for a copy of Windows if you'd just release a version of it for $200 or less that doesn't gimp some functionality I need (such as support for multiple processors) and is at least moderately stable.

Tue, 06 Jan 2009 10:16:28 GMT

I will never speak ill of the Rock Band series again if this track ever appears in an iteration of it.

I have no fucking willpower.

Mon, 05 Jan 2009 04:05:49 GMT

So, the WoW bug has infected me again, and I got WotLK and renewed my subscription. That said, I am a wee bit tired of playing nothing but Horde (mostly because I think dwarves are awesome) so if anyone of you peoples who pay attention to this thing wants to join me in rolling up some Alliance chars, feel free to give me a prod. This also extends to rolling up Horde characters too, I'm just leaning towards Alliance.

Wed, 31 Dec 2008 10:24:11 GMT

Pleasant dreams!

Tue, 30 Dec 2008 00:28:30 GMT

Ugh. All the "are you gonna be smart and implement Fair Tax" questions on change.gov make me feel stabby. Anyone who thinks Fair Tax is a remotely good idea has fuck-all of an idea how economics work, and should not be taken seriously in an economic discussion.