Another weekend come and gone. This one feels a little different, mostly due to scheduling vagaries. What do I mean by that? Well, usually I’m pretty good about keeping “work” to the weekdays and doing “house stuff” or other things that aren’t paying work on the weekends. That didn’t happen this weekend, mostly because I didn’t get everything done on Friday that I should have. Heck, I barely got anything done on Friday at all, since I spent the afternoon reading The Real Frank Zappa Book.
So I found myself waking up Saturday morning with a list of things to do: reorganize the office so I have room to set up the scanner; set up the scanner; scan photos for a client’s website; clean up the tailgating detritus in the garage so I could get my trike out for a ride; get to the liquor store to buy some beer for poker and ball games; and clean the table so we could play our monthly poker game on Saturday evening.
I got through the first few items with no real problems, but it turned out that I had forgotten to lock my scanner before packing it up at the old place. In the course of moving it, it had become misaligned so the red was a handful of pixels lower than the other colors, making for an interesting effect on the pictures I was scanning. Crud. No, you can’t recalibrate a scanner via software. They’re a commodity, and you need to buy a new one. So I did.
On the way home from the stores (I hit both CompUSA and the Apple Store, and found that the Apple store was only about $10 more for the scanner I ended up getting, and the sales guy was enough better that I was more than willing to pay the premium), I stopped off at one of the local gun shops and looked at some guns. I’m not really in the market for anything new, but it was a nice little break and I got to talk bears with the guy working there for a while, including a tale he told of a World Record Grizzly Bear that he’d gotten off the net. Partly True
says the urban legends database.
I also stopped by the liquor store on the way home. Good deal. Many items crossed off the list with the one trip.
Then it was time to do the scanning. That went well, and I rewarded myself with a brief nap and dinner. I cleaned up the table, and was ready for the poker game with time to spare. I still haven’t cleaned the garage, but what the heck, it’s not like I’ve been putting a ton of miles on the trike this year anyhow.
Sunday, hangover. Oof. Apparently Point Special has a higher hangover-factor than I’m used to. And with the Saints game starting at 5pm, the tailgating schedule had to be adjusted appropriately. Not much time between getting fully functional and heading out to the ballpark, but I managed a load of laundry.
I don’t think I like a 5pm start. The sun shines over the grandstand until about 6:15 or so, so you’re got the same cooking in the sun feeling that you do on a normal Sunday game. When the game is done, the sun is right on the horizon and in your eyes on the drive back to Minneapolis. It was interesting to try it once, but I’m happy that they’re not going to schedule early Sunday evening games next year. And the change in schedule didn’t help break the Saints’ Sunday Curse, and they lost 9-2.
Overall, it was a good weekend. I got caught up on the work stuff, and had time for some fun. But it didn’t feel especially weekend-like while I was in it. And today I find myself with a pretty full plate, with the normal Monday administrative stuff I have to do to keep the business running, plus a meeting with the client I mentioned on Friday, and then some work I want to get done for another client. Then again, it will probably turn out to be a pretty good day. I’m busy enough that I won’t be bored, but there’s not so much to do that I’ll feel overwhelmed. A pretty good start for a week, I guess.
And with that, how about some links?
- Did you know The Golden State has outlawed big SUVs on many of its roads but doesn’t seem to know it? So has Minneapolis. If you’re really against those oversized SUVs, or against the huge tax-break they enjoy, perhaps you can contact your local government and ask them to enforce the gross vehicle weight limit on local streets. Maybe you want to do the same if you like those big trucks, for as President Grant said:
I know no method to secure the repeal of bad or obnoxious laws so effective as their stringent execution.
[instapundit] - This year’s Defcon produced airpwn, an evil bit of software that replaces images on a wireless network with something gratuitously not safe for work. The description is okay, but don’t go looking at the pictures unless you want to test out your workplace’s filters…. [boing boing]
- Here’s some exciting science news. Immunotherapy Halts Alzheimer’s in Mice. Antibodies against the beta amyloid plaques not only cleared the plaques, but also cleared up the other problems that appear with Alzheimer’s. This also suggests that the plaques are the problem, and not a symptom as other research had suggested. [survival arts]
- Students and researchers at the University of British Columbia have built a Human Powered Helicopter and are planning to try and fly it tomorrow. Cool! [slashdot]
- In Fark Sells Out. France Surrenders, Wired points out that Fark has been accused of selling links. Drew responds that it was an overzealous salesman who’s since been fired. To make the policy around here clear, I’ll take compensation for links, but don’t always expect quick results. I’m still trying to finish the review copy of Beyond Fear that Bruce sent me to review. It’s a good book so far, but it’s dense, and for someone who spends as much time reading about security issues online as I do, much of it is review. Then again, there’s a larger picture that shows up in the book that you don’t get from isolated articles. Hey! Did I just finish the review? In any case, I don’t exactly have people beating down the door to buy links on Dave’s Picks, and don’t expect I will anytime soon. Nick Denton’s Media watch has more on fark, and Drew has responded to the Wired article. [wired]