The Big Brother Black Hole

The hype machine is gearing up for Big Brother '05 already. Next month I will drop off the face of the earth, once again slave to the glowing box that makes noises. I'll still be posting here, and I guess I'll still come to work, but only out of habit.

One ad proclaims "35 000 people applied for Big Brother 2005. Think you know how many are going in? Think again." Sam, upon seeing this, immediately theorised that all of them would go in. Just seal them up and say "no food - you'll have to eat each other". Mmm, cannibalism. Now that's entertainment!

I took the idea just a few steps further and imagined the biggest, most expensive, least real reality TV show ever: ZombieTown. Cordon off a massive playing field, hide food and foam/paintball weapons, hire about a thousand actors to play zombies. Last one "alive" or first one to reach the military-controlled safe zone wins, depending on which happens first. Prize is dependent on how many people arrive at the safe zone together, to encourage cooperation.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - You must have seen the zombie link coming.
PPS - Seriously, what else do I ever talk about?

A dark sense of foreboding

We have a "staff briefing" on today from 9am until who-knows-when. Last year the topics of discussion included:

• How much money our hard work is making for other people.
• How long certain people have been working hard to make lots of money for other people.
• How much the public opinion helps us make money for other people.

I fell asleep last year. This year I may bring a pillow.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - The "other people" mentioned are the company shareholders.
PPS - Our managers are all shareholders above a certain level. They give the presentation.

The Sunday Mok - Another Short Week

Last Sunday I was still at AGMF, which is why no Sunday Mok appeared then. I suppose I could have done it later but, er, I didn't. It was a good day, I saw some good bands, and that's about it.
Monday we packed up and left Toowoomba. My own luggage had decreased in volume, and the girls had managed to expand. I was horrified at the way their tent was packed up. Our late breakfast at McDonald's would have been the second-last straw in a weekend load of fatty food. One more day there and I think I would have taken ill.
Tuesday was back to work, where I achieved some positive things. Karate in the evening meant being separated from the group to work on my kata. Since kata is one of the more strenuous aspects of karate for me, I was sore for a couple of days following that.
On Wednesday, besides the office grind and watching myself on video, I played City of Heroes as my defender and completed a zombie-killing mission that was giving me trouble.
Thursday the weather turned colder. Cold for sub-tropical Brisbane, that is. It's not like we can see our breath or anything. I got some real user feedback about DailyDownloads, one of my personal projects, so I spent my lunch hour fixing it up for a new release. I played more CoH in the evening.
On Friday I worked more on DailyDownloads, just up to the point where it needed debugging and tidying up before a release. I missed the first night of youth group in order to attend a cast & crew party for the Easter play, which was cool. I like hanging out with musicians and actors.
Saturday I succumbed to a kind of madness - I went into the office to finish off DailyDownloads and also scan some more of my university notes. In the afternoon I slept and cleaned out a backlog of recorded television on my PC, as well as finally getting the internal audio connector cable working for the TV tuner card. That's much better than the external version for several reasons.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - DailyDownloads is a program I wrote to get my web comics daily and make sure I don't miss any.
PPS - Available on request. ;)

LMAO

Okay, this right here contains the funniest stuff I've seen in over a month. It's from Mitch Hedberg's standup comedy, which is cool, coz he's funny. Watch the video clips in order if you've got the bandwidth. If you can only watch one, watch the last one.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - Tragically, he's dead now.
PPS - That was one funny dude.

Empathise this

Checking the Big Brother site just now (because I have no life) I found this under the other info about house building status and housemate background checks:

• Ten pregnancy empathy bellies ordered.

Now either that's going to be one of the house challenges or the builders and producers are gearing up for a really bizarre launch party. It'd be really interesting to see even more detailed info there, such as "Fired the sandwich lady".

Mokalus of Borg

PS - Or "Stubbed my toe on new house foundation".
PPS - "Tested InsanityCorp 'Icy-Cold(TM)' bedroom sprinkler system".

Like your voice on tape, but worse

So last night I watched the video recording of the Easter play. In my opinion, from that distance, my performance was static and tense, like a life-size marionette with arthritis. I can understand why so many actors refuse to watch their own work, as if that makes it any better. I can also see tremendous value in it - I must know these things if I am to get better at anything I do. If I'd had the benefit of a videotaped dress rehearsal between then and opening night, I'm sure I would have done better.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - I started working on improving the physical expression immediately.
PPS - Then I remembered that I'll never be performing that script again.

Resident Evil 2

Movie Review: Resident Evil: Apocalypse

Would you see it again in the cinema? Probably only if it was free.
Would you buy the DVD? Not this time.
Will you watch it again on television? Once is enough.
Good points? Girls kicking serious zombie ass.
Bad points? Weak second half.

One of my favourite passtimes is being scared to death of zombies. In a pinch I'll take an action-oriented zombie movie instead. That's RE:A - action, not horror. Technically there's sci-fi too, but it's so weak nobody should have bothered. As long as Milla was running around shooting zombies, I was happy. I'm easy to please that way. Once the Umbrella Corp bigwig got involved the movie took a downturn. I guess that's upper management for you.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - I feel this movie was worth the two dollars I paid.
PPS - Plus I get to give it back now.

AGMF Annual Report

There are probably only one or two better ways to spend a long weekend than camping in Toowoomba for the Australian Gospel Music Festival. I had an awesome time and enjoyed all the music I heard. The following bands/performers are awesome, in alphabetical order:

5th Attempt
Alabaster Box
Anita Thomas
Another Day Down
Brooke Fraser
Chris Poulsen Trio
Compliments of Gus
Delirious?
The Frugals
Half Way Out
Halfway There
Hillsong United
Jael
Joel Hockey
The Lads
Light of Love
Nikki Kummerow
Nuclear Penguin
Planetshakers
Rookie
Scat
Shrimp Shack Jazz Band
Simeon
Sonicflood
Soulframe
Speaking of Sarah
Wone

I got myself signed CDs by The Lads and The Frugals, and an unsigned one by Scat. I spent most of the weekend looking through the program booklet for the words "punk" or "ska", and this has served me rather well, although I did expose myself to some jazz and straight rock, too. If you've never been, and you enjoy Christian music of any style, I definitely recommend AGMF.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - I'm now sponsoring a boy in the Philippines through the Compassion organisation.
PPS - Because I can.

Real Showers Rule

I've just got back from a weekend in Toowoomba - the Australian Gospel Music Festival. I'll have a full report on your desk in the morning, sir.

I was camping on-site, which meant portable hired showers and toilets for thousands of people. The shower trailer I chose to use had tiny cubicles separated by vinyl dividers and thin shower curtains. A shelf ran down the entire length of the trailer above head height for storing personal items like clothes and towels.

Although the quality of these mobile shower trailers was better than I expected, the first thing I did when I got home was jump in a real shower where you have room to swing your elbows and can place your belongings safely a short distance away.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - The trailer was inadequately ventilated, too.
PPS - So all the steam condensed on the ceiling and dripped back down.

The first rule of Anti-Social Club is...

Our office social club is currently holding a "hot" cross bun morning tea. I went downstairs and buttered two rolls, then came straight back upstairs to my desk. That's the way it works in the Anti-Social Club (membership: me). Here's the rules:

• If you want in, you're out.
• We do not actively participate in social club functions, though we are members.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - There are a few by-laws and so forth to help interpretation of the rules.
PPS - There are bonus points for being particularly ZEN and weird at social club events.

Australian Idiot

I remember being a bit disappointed with Green Day's album American Idiot at first, thinking that they had been too concerned with telling their "Jesus of Suburbia" story, but the more I listen to the album the more I appreciate it. This is not just Green Day punk rock. This is punk music. A cohesive, frankly brilliant, rock opera.

It's not packed with high-energy hits like the title track, so it takes a little more time to sink in and be appreciated. I'd say this is one of those albums that will get mentioned near the top of Green Day's discography as a defining work. It'll hang around for years, gaining fans and position in the list.

I can't speak for the future of the band, or the taste of their fans-yet-to-be, but I do believe in this album as quality, even if it's the story of Jesus of Suburbia, Saint Jimmy and Whatsername.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - I often find myself queueing up the entire album for a long session.
PPS - That's really the best way to hear it.

That bug

After rehearsing for a little over two months and performing just two nights, I feel like it's not enough. I don't want to let it go. I can't stop the dialogue ringing in my head. I'm refining a performance days after it's all over.

I want to be doing this all the time. I want to live, breathe, eat, sleep and drink acting. I want regular rehearsals. I want to have to constantly be remembering new dialogue. I want to be on stage and on screen. I want to meet other actors and study with them. I want to pretend to be a new person every single day.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - Perhaps this year I will enroll in a part-time acting course.
PPS - Or maybe I'll just memorise dialogue from sitcoms and repeat it at random moments.

Cheque me out

I had a thought the other day about limiting online credit card fraud: digital cheques. Imagine that I go to my bank's website and instruct them to set aside a certain amount from one of my accounts. This reserved amount is assigned a code, and that code can be given out to vendors instead of my credit card details.
Advantages: I'm guaranteed, in the worst case scenario, to lose only the amount of that one cheque. Keep credit card details safe. Don't even need a credit card, in theory. Can give cheques to others (family members, for example) to spend on your behalf.
Disadvantages: Some usability loss, still no guarantee on receipt of goods.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - I'd be interested to know if any banks are already offering a service like this.
PPS - I don't think anyone is, though.

Attack of the Zombies, Mate

Movie review: Undead

Would you see it again in the cinema? If it was re-released, yes.
Will you buy the DVD? Maybe if I see it on special for less than $20.
Will you watch it again on TV? At least once more.
Good points? Zombies, Aussie humour.
Bad points? Characters that will not bloody calm down.

I say to you "Australian B-grade movie" and you'd lose interest almost immediately, I'm sure. If I say "Australian B-grade zombie movie clearly written by a fisherman" and there must be a dark pile you'd relegate it to straight away. If you then watch the first five or ten minutes of Undead, you'll be certain you were right. The whole thing is on-par for a B-grade movie, with a B-grade plot, B-grade actors and shot on B-grade film stock. Yet somehow it all pulled together for me.

The panicky cop started to irritate me a bit, mostly because every effing second effing word from his effing mouth started with 'f' and rhymed with truck, and I'm not exaggerating here. It was done for comic effect, just a bit overdone in my opinion. Despite that, it seems to work, but it is definitely a B-movie, and takes itself about as seriously as that. Check it out and gasp in horror at mid-range production values!

Mokalus of Borg

PS - The aliens definitely steal the show.
PPS - I thought the shotguns bolted together was a bit much.

The Sunday Mok - The Sick Actor

Last Sunday I definitely had the flu. My voice was failing and I was coughing, sneezing and dripping everywhere. Rehearsal in the afternoon felt all wrong to me, possibly because we jumped right in without warming up.
Monday I stayed home sick from work and spent the day watching television and sleeping. I did go to bible study in the evening and felt unfocused and lethargic.
Tuesday I went back to work, still lethargic and medicated. I was dead tired by 4pm and considered going home then, but it seemed silly to take about one hour of sick leave in a day. Brad had redesigned the application framework we were using for Venture, so I had to start getting used to that.
After Wednesday at work I needed extra sleep at home, though I did get through the day well enough. I got sick of writing database mapper classes for Venture, so I wrote one big one to take care of most of the tedious work for me and just needs to be configured.
Thursday I stayed home sick again. I think I should have taken Monday and Tuesday off instead, because that would have helped me get better sooner. I decided to cut out all my extra-curricular activities except the dress rehearsal and performance. I got through the dress rehearsal well enough, and collapsed afterwards. We did two runs right through, and the second one was the better one.
Friday I was back at work again for a relatively uneventful day. I stayed home from youth group and watched Undead on television. I didn't take any flu tablets all day and felt okay.
Saturday was a pretty big day, really. I played City of Heroes in the morning, then tried to sleep until afternoon. Dad and I went shopping briefly and I looked for the season 1 box set of Stargate SG-1, but couldn't find it. The performance in the evening went quite well, though we did skip a little bit of one scene and I left the stage too early in another, so I missed a line. Bridgit, Kirsty and Erin came to see the play, then left too quickly for me to catch them there. I cut short my participation in the pyjama party at Bridgit's afterwards due to tiredness.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - There's still time to catch the second performance.
PPS - Now I need to sleep some more.

The Rehearsal Must Go On

There is one way - and one way only - to get through a four-and-a-half hour dress rehearsal with the flu: paracetamol, pseudoephedrine and codeine. I've been sick all week, and nothing much is helping me get better. I'm swilling orange juice in enormous quantities, sleeping constantly and all the rest. Very little in the way of positive results so far, although I do have my voice back. I struggled through the Jesus play dress rehearsal last night (two full runs through) and had to be carried home in a bucket.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - I'm surprised no pharmaceutical company has tried to name their flu remedy "pseudo-paraceta-coda-ephedrina-mol".
PPS - Well, not actually that surprised.

Infinite sets

For those of you that sometimes wonder what goes on in my head, let me show you a bit of it. I was thinking just now "Are there a finite number of angels?" and that got me wondering whether such a fact could be logically derived from the nature of God.

Assume that God exists and is the only being that is everywhere (omnipresent), all-knowing (omniscient) and all-powerful (omnipotent). Thus, angels are limited in space, knowledge and power individually. If they were infinite in number, then together they could be said to be everywhere, even if any individual was only in one particular place. By being everywhere as a group, they could certainly observe enough to know all the important things. And by their powers combined, (hehe - Captain Planet) they could accomplish great feats beyond the reach of any individual, and beyond even their own comprehension.

That is, as a group, an infinite set of angels could be comparable to God. This would mean either that there are a finite number of angels or that there are certain places they cannot go, certain things they cannot know and certain powers they cannot possess. This obviously begs the questions of how many angels are there or what are the specific limits on their power.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - In other words, how many angels can dance on the head of a pin?
PPS - This is a question I am not qualified to answer.

DartNet

Despite the unbelievable slowdown that would occur as a result, I think it would be interesting to adapt this idea to network communication between PCs. Rather than firing foam darts across the room, however, I propose developing a vacuum tube system spanning the office and using 1GB flash drives in padded cylinders to ferry data around. It would be monumentally pointless, and therefore must be attempted immediately.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - It would certainly impress the managers.
PPS - At least it's something they can see.

Games That Have Taken Over My Life

Via Apropos of Something I present the games that have become my breath during my short stay on your planet:

Space Quest: Naturally. It was in space, and that's pretty much enough to get any young'un hooked. Lasers, aliens, spaceships, a janitor: what's not to like?

Tetris: I bought a GameBoy once. I still have it. I own six cartridges for it. The only one I plugged in more than twice was Tetris, and I'm still playing.

XCOM: The first and second games in this series occupied my entire mind for a very long time. I mapped out entire levels. I developed the Ultimate Base Layout. I cracked the savegame format and wrote programs to resurrect my dead soldiers, reveal the entire mission map, rebuild bases at will and re-equip soldiers mid-mission. 'Nuff said.

City of Heroes: I am a superhero at last. Again, I am still playing.

Goldeneye: The first-person shooter for the N64, and I rocked so hard the room would tremble with my awesomeness. At least, I thought so.

Nebulus: A relatively obscure platformer for the Commodore 64, and I never owned one. I played this game at a "friend's" house after school, and I sucked, but I loved that little green bug-eyed guy.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - Honorable mention to The Sims.
PPS - And possibly to Super Mario 64.

Region Coding = Bad Thing

Here's a thought about DVD region coding: audio CDs are not region-coded and everything is well in their world. DVDs are region coded and consumers complain. DVD player manufacturers produce region-free players. People buy them. People demand non-region-coded players.

In other words, consumers don't want region coding in this age of a global economy. They are used to the internet which allows them to request and receive content on their own time from anywhere in the world. When you force a break in that model, people get upset.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - Information wants to be free, as in free speech.
PPS - Pirates argue for "free, as in free beer".

The Sunday Mok - Gearing up

Last Sunday I think I did rather well to stay awake during the morning church service, considering how much sleep I got the previous night. Then again, I used all my free time for the whole day to sleep, so I managed to get a fair amount in. I also had a rehearsal in the afternoon.
Monday's big event was the Green Day/Simple Plan concert, which rocked hard. I would have liked to be closer to the stage, but I guess you can't have everything.
Tuesday at work I just prepared some prototype screens for a web database we've codenamed "Panda". I like the idea of naming projects after endangered animals. It has a certain poetry to it. Rehearsal in the evening was focused on crowd scenes.
Wednesday I started nailing down the database structure for Panda. I played City of Heroes and The Matrix Online in the evening.
On Thursday we got a proper name for Panda: "Venture". We also named a set of old code "Cornerstone", because it's a good enough starting point for simple projects. Cornerstone needs some serious work, though. I skipped karate in the evening because I was feeling a little sick.
Friday I knew I was getting a cold, because I started up with a dry cough. At work we started actual coding for Venture, and I tried to incorporate some good design choices from the beginning. In the evening we took the youth group kids to play beach volleyball at Rebound at Enoggera, which was fun. It was indoor beach volleyball, though, which sounds like an oxymoron.
Saturday was mostly taken up with a tech rehearsal for the Easter play. It took about seven hours, so I was almost bored by the end. The whole thing went quite well, though, and I'm excited about how good the production will be.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - Now, however, I'm definitely sick and just soldiering on.
PPS - Remember the play performance dates.

Would you pay 5 cents for a song?

Okay, it's a day old and linked from Slashdot, but it took me this long to get my thoughts in order about the music industry opposition to this idea. This article suggests that music could be made available online for just 5 cents per song, and that this would attract a great percentage of the current illegal download market. The music industry objections are that this would conscript artists into a 5-cents-a-song model (as opposed to a "you must be big enough to sell millions of circles of plastic" model?) and that it would destroy record company incentives to invest in new acts. I'd like to answer the second point in more depth.

If a song is going to be available online, the distribution costs are near zero. If a record company doesn't believe in an act, then just sign them on a percentage of online sales and put their unproduced demo up. People might happen to like it, and there you have free money, a phrase which is sure to make the little dollar signs light up in their eyes. If nobody downloads a single copy of that music, then absolutely no harm is done. You didn't spend a cent, and the band don't have to be paid because nobody cares. Harsh, but that's capitalism for you. If a band's demo does turn out to be popular, then you can spend the money on producing a "proper" album, and maybe you can even charge more for those tracks.

The point is this: not everything coming out of a music company has to cost money before it can make money. Instead of spending money evaluating demos, deciding if they'll be popular enough, producing an album, cutting CDs, producing cover art and arranging for hype and advertising, just sign everyone on percentage, and make higher-quality production decisions based on demo revenues. It's easier that way, and it will make more money for less outlay.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - All will bow before Mokalus' +1 Hat of Internet Economics!
PPS - This concludes today's lesson.

Double-sided lie

I've kept notes from university for various reasons, not just the fact that I'm a packrat. Having recently discovered the scanner at work here, I now have an opportunity to turn paper into plastic and burn my notes (to CD and into ashes). However, it seems the setting "two-sided original" doesn't cause the scanner to copy both sides of the original document, so what I ended up with this morning was a file containing every second page from one set of notes.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - I was interrupted from further experimentation by someone who wanted to use the photocopier for "real work".
PPS - Whatever that means.

Easter Play

The Easter play I've been mentioning for a little while now is on in about a week. If you want to come along and see me pretend to be Caiaphas the High Priest (in a Rather Dashing Suit) and also Doubting Thomas, here's where to be and when to be there:

Place: Ashgrove Baptist Church, 7 Firhill Street, Ashgrove (Queensland, Australia)
Time: 7pm to 8:30pm on the 19th and 20th of March (same performance both nights)

Mokalus of Borg

PS - That's a week before Easter.
PPS - It's called "Jesus: Madman? Liar? God?".

Green Plan

Last night I was among the privileged thousands to see Simple Plan and Green Day play at the Brisbane Entertainment Centre. My ears are still ringing. I was shouting along with the best of them, showing total disregard for my own voice. That's the great thing about Green Day - for an hour or so, everyone's a rock star.

While the stage was being set between The Plan and The Day, a guy in a rabbit suit (drinking a beer) came out to keep the crowd warmed up. During the show itself there were enough explosions and stage effects to keep Jerry Bruckheimer satisfied, and enough music for everyone else, including many old classics and most of the American Idiot album.

Billie Joe kept moving his microphone stand down the front of the stage, and every time he left it for a second, a roadie would come and move it back. That amused me for a while.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - They found a few guys in the audience to play their instruments for a minute, too.
PPS - When Billie introduced the band members, he named himself "Asshole".

The Matrix Online

I'd like to tell you about The Matrix Online, but I am bound by a non-disclosure agreement. Fortunately, their people have provided a nifty program to sift through things like blog posts and remove unpostable material! So here's my initial impressions of The Matrix Online, helpfully censored by NDA-bot:

The Matrix Online ####### ## # ####### ############## ############ the ###### ###### ##### #####. The controls ###### #### #### ### a ####### #### ########## ## and ##### #####, ############ graphics ###### ######## ##### ### ########### #### ### ####### missions ### ###### ## ###### ### very large peacock feather painted orange.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - I hope this has been enlightening.
PPS - Thankyou, come again!

The Sunday Mok - Felt kinda busy

I've felt a bit overrun at times this week, and that's one of my least favourite feelings.

Last Sunday involved church, rehearsal, sleep, church and bowling, in that order. There was also some television, painting, reading and gaming in there.
Monday at work I was researching knowledge management programs, which was interesting. Bible study in the evening and also another Stargate SG1 episode.
Tuesday I was in freeform R&D mode at work, due to an absence of projects. I looked into creating Visio extensions for most of the day, and that was as far as I got.
Wednesday was when I watched 28 Days Later, and also tried unsuccessfully to install Windows XP Service Pack 2 on our net gaming box. I should try again sometime.
Thursday I noticed a problem with our secondary internet machine, which is quite old now. I had a plan for gradual upgrades, but I might just move my own PC out here instead. At work I just muddled together some tiny utilities for my own interest and use.
Friday Jeff got us started on a project information management database, because he only has access to project information he stores himself and wants a good way to do it. For youth group, we went out to a church at Redcliffe. On the way back, we went via the airport and through Fortitude Valley, which is so wrong it's not funny. Apparently we took a wrong turn very early.
Saturday I saw Hitch, played some games and went out at night with Kym and Bronwyn, which was fun.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - I spent Sunday mostly sleeping in between essential activities.
PPS - I must have caught up about three hours in total.

I want to believe

Movie review: Hitch

Would you see it again at the cinema? Yeah, probably.
Would you buy the DVD? I think I will.
Will you watch it again on TV? If there's nothing else on.
Good points? That whole thing about believing in love again.
Bad points? Embarrassment by proxy.

Hitch is definitely a good movie. It's a good romantic comedy, too. I am impressed - probably more than I expected.
There are two kinds of guys in the world: good guys and jerks. Good guys are invisible most of the time, because (a) they're terrified of messing it up and (b) they don't believe in themselves enough. You don't need me to tell you about jerks. Hitch is just a guy who knows how it all fits together and shows the good guys the ropes. It's never specific to the one situation, and it's not a lie. This is the kind of stuff that should be in the manual.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - It doesn't even have to be very long.
PPS - I'll take a pamphlet, if it comes to that.

Spectacular

One-dimensional Tetris. You can play all day without even looking!

Mokalus of Borg

PS - It's the ultimate in lazy gaming.
PPS - And they actually implemented it. Unbelievable.

28 Days Later

Movie review: 28 Days Later, written last night after viewing.

Would you see it again in the cinema? Please don't make me.
Would you buy the DVD? Only if forced at gunpoint.
Will you watch it again on TV? No, thankyou.
Good points? Zombies.
Bad points? Now I won't be able to sleep for three days.

I didn't realise I was scared until I walked past the stairwell and disturbed a sheet of paper. When it hit the ground and made a noise, I jumped, in that my head hit the bloody ceiling and my heart stopped for six seconds. This is not - repeat NOT a movie to watch at home alone on a dark, quiet night.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - I'm calm again.
PPS - I just watched the last fifteen minutes of Little Britain. Weird.

Red Pill

I have just been informed that my application to beta-test The Matrix Online was successful. I kind of wish I was at home so I could just start playing now.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - I don't expect too much from the game, really.
PPS - Then again, I haven't seen it yet.

Musiconomics

Apparently, digital music is too cheap. I kind of disagree, as I'm sure does everyone else. It seems to me that record companies have a poor understanding of economics and their marketplace. The fact that I think there is a problem with their understanding of economics means either

• that they've learned less through real experience than I did in two weeks of university economics classes OR
• I don't understand all the factors involved.

Despite its apparent arrogance, I'm going with the first option.

I don't think digital music has reached its optimum profit point yet. Lower prices means higher demand, and up to the supply/demand equilibrium point that means more profit. My assertion is that we are currently sitting at a price above that equilibrium point.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - The usual stated reason for higher prices is to keep bricks and mortar stores in business.
PPS - Something's got to give.

Handsome B. Wonderful

I've received some odd spam in my time (who hasn't?) but some that sticks in my memory is what gets through all the spam filters and firewalls and claims to be from someone with a clearly false name. The first one I received of this type was from "Weapon K. Respectable". This morning I just received one from "Reconsidering L. Hardwoods". Ah, the precious memories!

Mokalus of Borg

PS - I shall print it and frame it immediately.
PPS - Or delete it without reading it. Either way works fine.

Constantine

I thought I'd try a new review format for Constantine: a few quick questions.

Would you see this movie again at the cinema? Yes, if I was invited.
Will you buy the DVD? I don't plan to at this stage.
Will you watch it again on television? Yes.
Good points? Very well filmed (in my uninformed opinion) and interesting writing. Good effects too.
Bad points? Assistant reminiscent of Van Helsing's Carl.

I've always liked pseudo-religious mumbo-jumbo, possibly because I can usually point out where the theology differs from canon. The common mistake is dualism - the belief that God and Satan are equals at war, neither one being sovereign. I quite liked the portrayal of the Devil in this film (for his few minutes of screen time) as a white-suited man with dirty bare feet. The problem was that he should be one of the most dangerous beings in existence, and he wasn't even slightly scary.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - I think the questions preclude a rating system.
PPS - That's the theory for now.

The Sunday Mok - A Week of Fridays

For some reason, every weekday this week felt like a Friday.

Last Sunday at rehearsal, I found out we're finishing with a bow, which is just not something I do at a church performance. The singers, musicians and pastor do not bow after a regular service, and I'm not doing anything much different to that. It's not about me.
Monday was slow at work, like all the other days. Bible study in the evening.
Tuesday I was rushed everywhere except work. While I was cooking dinner I had some phone calls to make, and I just barely finished them and dinner in time to get to rehearsal.
Wednesday we farewelled Darth Gerard and Brant in the traditional way: cake. We also went to lunch and to the local pub for drinks after work. When I left, the tequila shots had started, and many more were planned.
Thursday's event of note was a "trailer trash" party at Erin's, where everyone dressed up like rednecks and hicks and spoke with terrible accents all night. Apparently it was a last-minute idea.
Friday night with the youth group we went to a golf driving range at Oxley. Since we ran out of golf balls fairly quickly, we spent some time hunting cane toads. The range was right by a creek, so there were plenty around. Cane toads are about the one thing I feel absolutely no remorse about killing, even in particularly violent ways.
Saturday I went running in the morning, shopping for odds and ends and also saw Constantine (review tomorrow).

Mokalus of Borg

PS - It's been a relatively slow and uncreative week.
PPS - We'll see how interesting I am next week.

House of Flying Daggers

I caught House of Flying Daggers the other night after rave review recommendations from co-workers. Overall, I was a bit less impressed with it than I was with Hero. Where Hero was mostly about visuals, Daggers seemed to be mostly about sound, which was different and interesting. What let it down was the relatively weak plot. If you're still wowed by slow motion graphical effects, see it. Otherwise, you might as well wait and see if it comes to television.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - Your home sound system might not do it justice, though.
PPS - I know mine wouldn't.

How to be annoying

Since I started work in an office, many interesting and unusual ideas have come to mind. Most of these I would not recommend actually attempting.

1. Ask "Get it?" after every joke you tell.
2. Point out often that Caramello Koala and Calvin Klein have the same initials.
3. Choose the noisiest snack foods available.
4. Leave your mobile phone on its loudest setting all the time. Never answer it. Claim you're screening calls for "potential candidates". Refuse to elaborate.
5. Any time you are asked to do something, reply with a brush-off handwave and say "I don't have time for that". Continue playing solitaire.
6. Decline meeting requests with cryptic replies like "I'm watching my figure".
7. Wear odd shoes.
8. Have a box of tissues on your desk. Every few weeks, empty it out, one tissue at a time, onto a co-worker's desk.
9. Construct thousands of paper cranes from important documents. Refer to them as your "army of the night".
10. Email a picture of a horse's head to your enemies.
11. Shred everything a day after it is handed to you, to "protect the secrets".
12. Insist on using a gaudy, headache-inducing colour-coded filing scheme.
13. Cover your desk in toys and gadgets of indeterminate purpose.
14. Install a satellite dish on your PC.
15. Re-organise your co-workers' desks, to improve efficiency.
16. Dial random extensions and hang up immediately.
17. Ask the receptionist if she'll still be there at midnight to take an "important delivery". Leave a briefcase and detailed instructions for making the trade.
18. Construct a model Eiffel Tower out of chopsticks from the local Chinese restaurant.
19. Offer to fix software problems with adhesive bandages.
20. Leave a cup of coffee on your desk for three months.
21. Turn your computer off, then call the I.T. support people and tell them you're having trouble with it.
22. Label the water cooler "urine samples".
23. Glue plugs into the hand basins in the toilets.
24. Offer to race co-workers down the corridors on wheeled chairs.
25. Construct a fort around your cubicle out of archive boxes.
26. Speak in Pig Latin.
27. Wear your sunglasses inside. Trip over everything.
28. Sell charity chocolates to raise money for your own overseas trip.
29. Booby-trap a big box on your desk. Label it "Do Not Open".
30. Exit through the alarmed fire door every day.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - Pass it on.
PPS - I could write more, but I think 30 at a time is plenty.

Soylent Diesel

This Slashdot article, detailing a process to turn carbon-bearing waste into fuel seems interesting to me. It brings to mind some questions about whether this process will be micro-sized and put in the back of every toilet. That would certainly be an excellent way to avoid the slow, disgusting compost toilets of today, as long as it doesn't stink more.

I also picture a "Mr Fusion"-esque device on the back of every car, though that is likely to be way less efficient than it's worth. Probably the best idea is to supplement our car fuelling by transforming our household biowaste (food scraps, sewage, grass clippings, dead pets etc) into fuel via a micro-plant.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - Not just techie, but greenie, too!
PPS - And we create a whole new installation/repair/maintenance industry while we're at it.

Whose Chair?

It's rare to find my mind working more sharply after watching a sitcom, so I was genuinely surprised by a rerun of Mad About You the other night. This particular episode starred Carl Reiner as Alan Brady, and besides providing a few genuine belly-laughs, I thought the whole episode was very well done - like a series of comedy sketches all tied together by a coherent plot. Seriously, it was some of the best writing I've seen in television in some time.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - I have no idea who Alan Brady really is.
PPS - Keep the pineapple.

Tankity-Tank

Discussing what activity would best suit our section breakup, we mentioned go-karting and paintball. Together. I picture mounted guns and a track. Apparently, I didn't take it far enough. Now the plan involves micro-size tanks with supercharged paintball turrets. We need speed, too. Darth Gerard suggests balsa-wood farmhouses and families to crush because, well, he's evil. This is a definite winner. I'd pay for it for sure.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - In the time I'm writing this, we've moved on to placing zombies on the field.
PPS - I'm skipping the koala-hunting part of the discussion.

Timeshare Plot Holes

A while ago I was inspired. I had a muse. I was kickin' it freestyle, yo. Then it all went away quicker than an intelligent sitcom gets axed. I don't know where it went, but I'm guessing it's still around here somewhere. Always in the last place you look, eh?

So I was watching Buffy season 3 episode 1 last night, where some demon has some kind of steel mill or something set up in another world where "time moves more quickly". He was grabbing homeless kids off the streets and working them almost to death, then dumping them back into the "real" world. In our world, only a day passes while they age away to frailty.

The problem with this system, as I see it, is that you'd need a completely new workforce every single day on our time. If I'm generous towards Mr Industrialist Demon, he only needs fifty people for a complete workforce. Surely fifty missing people per day would start to be noticed when they all come from one small area of Los Angeles? Even if they're not, it'd be a full-time job just to round up that many people and push them into a hole in the ground - no time for the health screening and trickery he was employing.

I guess my point is that time dilation might sound cool, but it does manufacture a lot of new problems.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - Just Say No to Time Dilation!
PPS - Before it's too late!

The Sunday Mok - Disbanded

Last Sunday I learned that the Ashgrove Baptist Easter play and AGMF are on different weekends, so I can actually do both, which makes me happy.
Monday at work I was figuring out a bug related to the .NET DataGrid control and cell highlighting. I don't think anyone's particularly interested in the details. Bible study in the evening.
On Tuesday I fixed that bug. Easter play rehearsal in the evening and I watched a new episode of The Simpsons instead of a hired DVD. I couldn't find anything interesting in the tiny video store across the road from the office.
Wednesday was when we got the news about our project moving and our section being cut down to four. Now Gerard, Ben and Brant are leaving this coming Wednesday, which will actually leave only three of us there. In our worst-case scenario, we become a temporary addition to the computer help desk. I don't much want to do that.
Thursday I spent thoroughly documenting part of the work I've done, and I think it came up really well. Later in the day, Fletcher asked me to tell him about that bit from a purely "black-box" point of view. How to build and deploy it without needing to understand it.
More documentation on Friday, but it looks like our work will probably just be thrown away if the project continues at all. There's a new Basic Requirements Edict from up on high that greatly simplifies the entire thing and pretty much negates everything we thought we needed to do.
Saturday I noticed I was craving chocolate, which usually means I'm losing weight and my body disagrees with the idea. I spent time in a meeting about the church fair, working out what I need to do beforehand, then went shopping for some painting supplies. I'm painting an old PC case to donate to the church fair, just to see if it generates some interest. I also gave a preview performance of one of the Easter play scenes.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - It's been a rich, full week.
PPS - That's if you can count the emptying of the office as rich and full.

Grammar Nazi

Every time I hear or see someone say "would of" instead of "would have" or the "would've" contraction, it really irks me, probably much more than it should. For example, I'm still stomping around the house this morning correcting imaginary people for imaginary grammatical crimes because of a girl on the bus yesterday afternoon who made this exact mistake.

So, for everyone who's unsure, the following sentences are incorrect in the most potent sense of that word:
"I should of gone, but I didn't."
"I would of watched it, and then I fell asleep."
"I could of come over, I guess."

For the correct forms, replace "..ould of" with "..ould've" or "..ould have".

Mokalus of Borg

PS - Even just writing them down like that is distasteful to me.
PPS - It's entirely possible that my issue is more deeply rooted than grammar.

At The Races

Angry Brad: Anything is race-able.
Darth Gerard: I'm trying to think of exceptions.
Angry Brad: Not working, is it?
Bachelor Brant: What about dogs?
Me: You mean like greyhounds?
Bachelor Brant: Yeah! Oh.
Me: How about cats? They wouldn't co-operate.
Angry Brad: You'd just have to put the greyhounds behind them.
Bachelor Brant: Wouldn't a greyhound outrun a cat?
Darth Gerard: Not if it's a lion.
Me: How do you get a greyhound to chase a lion? Or would you reverse it in that case?
Darth Gerard: Yeah, so it'd go: rabbit, greyhound, lion. Man with gun. Then lion again. Then another man with a gun.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - That guy in the middle had better be the fastest man alive.
PPS - I'm guessing he wouldn't do much shooting.

The Culling

As of today our section of 8 is a team of 4 and our one project is moving to Melbourne. Apparently the decision was made a week ago, then nobody said anything for a week, while the edict trickled down from above like warm tar over stones. Adrian, Brian and Ben are already gone and (perhaps the most devastating news for this blog) Darth Gerard will be gone in another week, once the project transfer is done.

This decision was made to speed the project up and keep its budget tight, in apparent ignorance of the massive time and cash overhead that will be incurred to make the transfer happen.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - We received this news in a five-minute meeting and a four-sentence email.
PPS - The full reasoning behind the decision was, apparently, classified.

Trademark'd!

Me: Everyone's sneezing this morning.
Darth Gerard: There's never been a comic book archvillain that makes people sneeze, has there?
Me: Well, they exist, but they never rise very high. Like Dr Pepper.
Darth Gerard: Hah! Trademark. You're going to jail.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - If Dr Pepper was a villain, what would he look like?
PPS - All I can think of is a utility belt holding several pepper shakers.

Distract me

This article describes the many distractions we face in our daily lives at the mercy of our computers. I think it might be time to centralise alerts into some kind of user alert queue. We'd have one place for all programs to send alerts easily, via the operating system, and as users we could manipulate its behaviour, assigning higher priorities to alerts from some programs, setting it to only notify us at regular intervals, etc.

Not only would this free programmers from the burden of creating a notification system for every program, it would unify the alert interface for users and allow them greater control from one central location.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - I do think this is a good idea.
PPS - Comments are welcome through to next month. ;)

"Critical" Notepad Bug

I seem to have discovered a new bug in Microsoft Notepad 5.1 (it may also appear in other versions). I'd report it on support.microsoft.com, but there does not appear to be a "Support Centre" for Notepad - a glaring omission. On to the bug.

To reproduce this bug, open Notepad and turn on WordWrap^tm. Now type away until you wrap around at least one line. Save the file with the cursor at the end of the line, and you should notice that the cursor moves back three characters for each wrapped line you typed. If that motion backwards takes the cursor over a line break in the process, the cursor will move back another character in addition to the others.

This bug does not appear to have been reported elsewhere, so I'm claiming credit for its discovery.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - Clearly nothing good can come of this.
PPS - I expect Microsoft will release an emergency hotfix patch within a week.

Happy Love Day

I've decided to stop just short of actual bitterness and anger at This Day We Do Not Speak Of. Maybe next year my tune will change. This year I've decided to project an air of barely-contained disgust and partake in occasional acts of sabotage. My path will be littered with torn and destroyed heart decorations, as it is written.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - To everyone in love: don't you dare rub it in my face.
PPS - Even accidentally. I'm watching you.

The Sunday Mok - 13 February 2005

Last Sunday we were at the morning church service late, so rushing home, wolfing down lunch and rushing back got me there just in time for rehearsal. I sang out front in the evening service, then went bowling. I scored a disappointing 95 then a more-acceptable 153.
On Monday it was hot enough at lunchtime that I worked up a bit of a sweat walking the one block to the bank then a hundred metres or so to the Thai restaurant. Bible study in the evening, then City of Heroes. I also read some humourous stories on SomethingAwful.com about The Sims 2. The first one's better.
Tuesday's movie rental was The Village. I think I preferred The Sixth Sense. It did make me want to check out the other M. Night Shyamalan movie I haven't seen: Signs.
On Wednesday night I played Evil Genius for a while and watched the first part of the ARIA Awards that I recorded way back in October. I know that's pretty slack. I also know that, so far, it hasn't affected my life negatively, so I'm comfortable with my choice.
Thursday night's karate class ended with a few games that were more of an intense workout. Besides the fact that there were three teams racing to be the first one finished, I'd question their classification as "games" at all. I played City of Heroes, too.
On Friday I got an unexpected lift home from work, and I thought I'd take advantage of the extra time by going for a run. As it turns out, there wasn't so much extra time, so I got to the church about ten minutes late for youth group. We had another zero-attendance night. I do wonder how long we'll keep going without anyone coming.
Saturday I got up early to have breakfast in the Roma Street Parklands for Bec's birthday. When other people rocked up with gifts, I felt like a cheapskate. I stayed in the city afterwards and bought a Stargate magazine purely for the DVD, and some game cases from JB HiFi.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - The Stargate magazine is quite lame.
PPS - The introduction is written in-character as Jack O'Neill. 'Nuff said.

Giveaway

I have just received an email from the City of Heroes support staff that includes a code for 14 days of free CoH play to be given away to a friend. Rather than I decide who to send it to, I thought I'd open it up to anyone who reads here and wants to know what all the fuss is about. I'll email the code to the first person to leave a comment asking for it.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - If I don't already have your email address, you'd better include that.
PPS - I'm guessing that the 14 days have to be two calendar weeks, not just whenever you feel like it.

A saucy good time

Over lunch at the "local" Chinese restaurant, I thought I'd try pouring the remnants of my sauce all over my shirt, because I'd never given that a go before. The verdict? It's not as much fun wearing food as eating it.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - I have to clean up now.
PPS - Stupid non-stick bowls.

Sorry, Sandra

We're all naturally dubious about sequels. We've been given plenty of reason. Sequels starring Sandra Bullock seem to be doubly doomed. Don't get me wrong: I'm not a Bullock detractor. I think she's done some mighty fine work, including Speed, 28 Days and Miss Congeniality.

That being said, I can't bring myself to be enthusiastic about Miss Congeniality 2 - Armed and Fabulous. Not only does the story seem contrived, but some studio "genius" has decided to also turn this into Ethnic Mismatch Comedy Number 644 as well.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - All I'm saying is that she could be doing better comedy than this.
PPS - Nothing much decent is coming out in the next few months.

PAX

One of these years I'm gonna fly my butt halfway around this big ol' rock we call home and get into Penny Arcade Expo, just for the hell of it. I'm not even that hardcore, as a gamer. I'm pretty much only into puzzles and adventures, which have recently metamorphosed into RTS and RPGs respectively, like a frog turning into a toad. Yeah, I know that doesn't actually happen. Just go with it.

If SupaNova in April is good enough, I'll just save myself a week's worth of leave and a ton of cash and be satisfied.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - Something may be wrong with my posts from work at the moment.
PPS - It looks to me like my last couple of days have not shown up.

A scary thought

Combine the hypothesis that there is no life in the universe besides what has originated on Earth with the fact that George W. Bush is the most powerful man in the world and what do you get? George W. Bush is, in fact, ruler of all life in the universe. This could be a problem.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - Perhaps I'm overstating the case.
PPS - I really hope so.

Fogey

Could the archaic term "ice-box" come back into regular use as a synonym for "portable cooler"? I ask because I saw it written once on the label of my Ice Break iced coffee as a prize in some competition. No doubt they chose to use it because of its similarity to their brand name, but I think it's a valid choice. Perhaps I shall start using it in that sense.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - In Queensland we tend to call it an "esky".
PPS - It's a brand name, possibly derived from "eskimo".

He'll grow into it

Just now on the way to work I saw a boy walking to school. This in itself is not unusual - there's a school nearby and I'd be surprised on a day that I didn't pass a few hundred such students. What struck me was that this particular lad was just barely over a metre tall and was carrying a backpack that could have easily contained his entire person, should that have become necessary. He was powering along under the clearly considerable weight of the pack like a trooper on a mission.

It's anyone's guess what he needs to carry that regularly fills such a capacious vessel. I'm guessing that even if he lugs six large textbooks every day, plus notepads and a pencil case, then throw in a large lunch (he's a growing boy) and he'd still have room for an emergency jumper and ice-climbing equipment.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - You know, in case the next ice age comes.
PPS - In which case he's already got a serviceable tent.

Shrimp

I went bowling last night to take advantage of Milton Tenpin's $3.50 games on Sunday nights. When I told the guy behind the counter that I wanted size six shoes, he gave me a funny look.
"Are you sure?"
"Yes. Size six, please."
"Really?"

He wouldn't believe me until I actually showed him my tiny, tiny feet. This could easily become my next big hangup. I mean, guys are meant to have big feet. It's demoralising to rock up to the counter with five other guys and be the only one who asks for shoes smaller than size eleven.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - It's almost enough to make me buy my own bowling shoes.
PPS - If I start going more regularly, I probably will do so.

The Sunday Mok - A New Routine

This week was the first incarnation of a changed weekly routine that's going to be the norm until Easter. Now from Sunday to Saturday I have rehearsal, Bible study, rehearsal, YLD, karate, youth group, sleep.

Last Sunday was the first rehearsal for a church Easter play. I think it's all going to come together nicely. I'm playing the chief priest Caiaphas, and also the disciple Thomas. I left without saying goodbye to anyone, because I was still in a bad mood about the previous night. I went to the Coffee Club after the evening service, with Bridgit, Erin, Michelle and Scott.
Monday night was the first "Disciple" Bible study meeting. I got a bit bored in the middle, primarily because I'm a visual guy and this was all aural. After I took a break to look at some interesting things around the room, I could focus again.
Tuesday nights are now also Easter play rehearsal, which means karate has had to move to Thursdays. We were blocking out the first few scenes, just figuring out where everything should go, where people should enter and leave, etc. I also rented Resident Evil on DVD.
Wednesday night I paid very little attention to a youth leadership development meeting. That was probably bad of me.
By Thursday I was feeling a little bit frustrated with work again, because I've been working on the one bit of the project since the beginning of time. Karate in the evening was good - sensei Chris is more ready to correct me than Mark and Deb, because I've never taught him. I was "sensei John" to Mark and Deb for a year, and I think that they held on to that for a while after they took over the class and I went back to being a regular student.
On Friday night at the youth group we had one young person in attendance. I guess it's better than last week. I'm a little worried about the future of the group. On the upside, the older SLAM youth group has a healthy attendance so far.
Saturday I bought a wireless optical mouse for the secondary internet PC here at home, because we've officially run out of desk space. I needed something that could reliably track on my leg. I went to a barbeque dinner at Casa de Miv, which was also going to include semi-organised sport in the park. Because I figured I'd be getting some exercise that way, I didn't run in the morning. When the time came, we just sat around his vast backyard. My left wrist is sore for some unspecified reason, so I've strapped it up for the next few days. That usually helps.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - It was good to see everyone again yesterday.
PPS - "We should do this more often", as the old saying goes.

Compatible Beats

No music seems to match my mood today. At least, nothing on my PC. Thirsty Merc hasn't been getting much play since Green Day made it into rotation with American Idiot, but since that album really needs to be heard in one session, I'm not up for it today. Missy Higgins is a bit too ... mellow for me right now. Gerald are, frankly, better live. I guess that leaves me with Jet, who inspire my sporadic attempts at air-drumming.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - I think I need to browse down in HMV.
PPS - Or the punk section of Rocking Horse.

Office Oddities

Darth Gerard: "Having a four-day weekend regularly would be good if you had outside hobbies. You can get a lot more done in four days than in two."
Veronica: "Or if you had a double-life."
Darth Gerard: "Peirce Brosnan-style."
Me: "What?"
Darth Gerard: "Jimmy Bond."
Me: "I don't think James Bond had a cover career."
Darth Gerard: "Nah, I'm pretty sure he was MoneyPenny. Have you ever seen James Bond and MoneyPenny in the same place at the same time?"
Me & Veronica: "Yes."
Darth Gerard: "Did you notice mirrors?"
...
Me: "That is probably the weirdest thing I've ever heard you say."

Mokalus of Borg

PS - We are an endless fount of meaningless drivel.
PPS - And constant strangeness.

Klutz

I'm definitely not at my most coordinated lately. Last night cooking dinner I dropped a total of four items - thankfully all non-pointy and empty at the time. I'm fumbling with remote controls, tripping over steps that aren't there, and bumping off walls like a pinball.

Tonight I have my weekly karate session. It's not looking too good.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - I'm sure I'll manage not to hurt anyone.
PPS - At least, anyone else.

Mourning Gestures

When something comes to an end, if I felt anything about it, I'll go through a mourning process, often involving anger, bargaining and sadness. When that comes to an end, I'll often feel the need to do just one more thing, and it's always different. I close off the episode by doing something outside my ordinary sphere. It usually takes a little while to figure out what that should be. This time around, I'm going to build a pressurised water pistol from various gardening equipment I'll buy at the hardware store.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - Often the gesture itself has nothing to do with the subject of mourning.
PPS - And sometimes it is deeply connected.

The Office Knight

I think I have problems. I just received an email advertising free surplus foolscap ring-binders at work. The first thing I thought was that maybe I could get a whole lot of them and make some cool cardboard plate mail armour.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - With my Stapler of Justice.
PPS - Now that's an interesting City of Heroes character idea...

Stick Cricket

I'd heard about this game from friends, so I decided to give it a go. For a while I was frustrated by the way that any appeal means the batsman is out. If you nick the ball and it goes behind you, that's caught. If I keep playing, I'm sure I'll get good (and come to peace with the idea that the fielders appeal not to ask if you're out, but because you're already out). I don't know if I can be bothered, though.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - I am told that this game's busiest times are during work hours.
PPS - Unless this is everybody's job, people are being naughty, it seems.

The Sunday Mok - Tension and Stuff

Last Sunday was a standard-issue day. Nothing overly remarkable about it. Two church services plus supper at The Coffee Club.
On Monday I found that the upstairs vending machine at work rejected my five dollar note every time. I have yet to try with a different five to see if the fault is in the machine or not. I think it's the machine. I also had a meeting for the church April Fair, during which I got some good sketching done.
Tuesday was work, then karate, then Erin's housewarming. The housewarming was pretty much segregated into Christians and Others. We stayed upstairs on the deck and only rarely ventured downstairs in search of drink receptacles. Very few of them came upstairs to meet us, though, so I guess we're even.
Wednesday was Australia Day, so I had the day off work. I went to brunch at Simpson's Falls via a lift with Bronwyn, then lunch at the Uniting Church to see the renovations to the old halls. After that, I basically just lazed around and listened to the end of the Triple J Hottest 100.
By the end of Thursday I had the biggest tension knots in my shoulders that the world has ever seen. Painful. Played City of Heroes and watched Joan of Arcadia.
On Friday we started up our year 8 & 9 youth group again, sort of. Have you ever thrown a birthday party and nobody showed up? It was like that. Exactly like that - the planned program for the night was a birthday party for everyone.
Saturday I saw Closer by myself. It was good, though I did find some of the dialogue unnatural. Nobody is that honest with themselves. I also saw Vicki for the first time in a month and probably the last time ever.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - Life sucks.
PPS - Again.

Dire Sun

I've been meaning to do this for a while. This right here is Dire Sun, my main City of Heroes character. He's a Tanker with the power sets Super Strength and Invulnerability. So ... Blogworld, meet Dire Sun. Dire Sun, meet Blogworld.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - Mingle.
PPS - You two play nice, now. 

Stop work meeting

The discovery of this blog at work has now resulted in near-zero productivity, at least for the moment. Angry Brad, Actor Adrian, Darth Gerard and Bachelor Brant are all thrilled to see themselves mentioned. The immediate goals of the office have changed from "software engineering" to "being wacky enough to blog".

Mokalus of Borg

PS - I expect someone to start juggling fire any moment.
PPS - I'll have to be more careful what I write in future.

Carving transistors out of stone

My people and I have a great tradition: if we want it and it doesn't exist, we make it. This policy of ingenuity and imagination serves everyone well. One common idea, as wireless networking and internet telephony become more widespread, is a single phone unit that acts as a VoIP handset when at home and a mobile phone when out and about. This is close, but no cigar yet. I'm sure someone is out there with a soldering iron and some electronic diagrams right now figuring out how to make one.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - I include myself with these tech innovators only on the software side.
PPS - And, actually, I rarely get to do anything cool.

It's time to go, Mokalus

If I'm being upbeat about the experience, I can consider the six hours or so of my Big Brother audition as an approximation of time in the house. I met some interesting and boisterous strangers. We talked, we joked. We even had some tasks. We were on camera. We met Gretel. I stood in front of a crowd of people who all wanted to be where I was, even if that was only at the front of the line. I made friends, and I made jokes. In the end, I was voted out.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - I can be positive about a great many things.
PPS - Not everything, but definitely many things.

A difference of opinion

I just went to pay a bill at the post office, and the drone behind the desk tried to tell me that I had to fill out a deposit slip. I countered with the fact that this has never been necessary before, at which point he caved in and processed the transaction without a deposit slip.

So I suppose when he said that I "had to" fill in this slip, he was exaggerating just a bit.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - Like saying "Earth has been invaded by giant blue aliens" when it actually hasn't happened at all.
PPS - That is, if that still counts as exaggeration.

Bloodshot and Shambling

The other day I saw some friends after a big night and asked them why they looked quote dead endquote.
Now I'm thinking it would have been funnier to just yell "ZOMBIE!" and run screaming in the other direction.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - At least now I'm prepared for next time.
PPS - Zombies. They never stop giving.

Green and Gold

I love Australia Day. It's like a Saturday in the middle of the week. An odd kind of Saturday when everyone wears flags and celebrates our national identity by cooking sausages outdoors and watching cricket. It's another one of those days when it's way too easy to overeat, especially if you have breakfast, brunch, lunch, an afternoon barbeque, dinner and an evening party.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - This year I have managed to have only five of those six eating opportunities.
PPS - Big shout out to all Aussies overseas, particularly Glenys, Amos, Dan and Lotte.

Every single hair is now wrong

I think a few months of DIY haircuts are starting to catch up with me. It's nothing too adventurous - I've just been clipping the back so that it's impossible to use the word "mullet" to describe my follicular arrangement. I've been waiting for the rest of my hair to grow out longer, and now I'm not sure what to do about the bits around my ears. I tuck it behind my ears and it looks pretty stupid. I let it fall forwards and it's too long. I'm not at all confident that I could cut it acceptably, so I may be off to the barber again.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - The Brisbane Summer Humidity(tm) isn't helping, either.
PPS - Nothing much does.

Nanu, Philosopher Extraordinaire

What would it be like if the major philosophers and scientists of our time had lunch with Keanu Reeves? According to our little clown troupe, the results would involve many comical contrasts between high thought and "whoa". The phrases "I caught my first tube today", "I know kung-fu" and "there is no spoon" would occur at least once each.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - We only ever refer to Keanu Reeves as "Nanu".
PPS - I don't know where this originated.

The Sunday Mok - The Joel Fan Club

Last Sunday was hot, humid, and generally unpleasant. I spent the afternoon asleep on a mattress on a concrete floor downstairs, which was the coolest I could get. I was still sweating. I sang in the evening church service and was extremely under-confident about it.
On Monday on the bus ride home, I bumped into Katrina, a friend from primary school who had just started a job nearby. That was quite bizarre. I guess I'll be seeing her regularly now.
On Tuesday I started a new habit of renting a cheap DVD from the video shop across the road from the office. I started with Kill Bill Volume 2, which I liked a bit better than the first volume, not because it was better, but because the first one was worse.
On Wednesday I briefly entertained the idea of opening a CafePress shop, basically for my own private use. In the end, I decided not to bother. I played City of Heroes as my Controller character and almost completed a mission solo, then died.
Thursday I attempted the same City of Heroes mission as my Controller with some help from a Scrapper who dropped out before the end of the mission and left me for dead. I'm sure he didn't mean to. I also finished reading The Eye in the Pyramid, the first book of the Illuminatus! trilogy. It's a bit mentally taxing sometimes, and yet it seems to demand a creative response from me, so usually I end up completely exhausted after reading some of this.
I spent Friday at work redesigning part of the system that handles our approvals process. It didn't feel like much progress after I tried it once and changed all my code around, only to discover a better way moments later. I also went to dinner at Roman Gardens, an Italian restaurant at Corinda with Miv, Julia, Lydia, Adam, Rory, Colleen, Julie, Steve and Bronwyn, who were seated around the table in that order. I just like showing off my memory sometimes. I really enjoyed the food.
Yesterday, Saturday, I waited in line for about five hours to try out for Big Brother. That was the most entertaining part. Shout goes out to the "Joel Fan Club": Emily and Dustin. Get some sleep, Emily - you'll need it. And good luck with the band. I also saw "How To Make a Monster", which is an exhibit at the Queensland Museum all about animatronics, which was very cool.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - Dad destroyed the light fitting in my room while trying to fix it.
PPS - At least he didn't electrocute himself, though. That's always a plus.

Silent phones and the voices in my head

It's office policy that mobile phones are off during work hours. To some people, this means nothing at all, and they let their phones ring loud and proud, irritating everyone nearby. Our section subverts the rule by leaving phones on vibrate, with the side effect that they are inaudible when ringing to nearby workers. The upshot of this is that people will occasionally start talking to themselves for no reason, usually starting with "Hello?".

Mokalus of Borg

PS - Typically much mirth ensues at this point.
PPS - We are easily amused.

Made-to-order consumer electronics

Picture this: you can imagine an electronic device you want, and it does not exist in the current market. You go to a website and tick off the features you'd like in this device ("plays digital music", "makes phone calls", "laser sword") and pay a nominal fee plus parts and postage. Within six to eight weeks, your device arrives, complete with user manual and warranty. How awesome would that be?

Even better, if a device already exists on the market that does what you need, the site can recommend it to you.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - The bonus to companies, of course, is good market research for new mass-production items.
PPS - I imagine these devices would be more expensive and a bit less polished than mass-market consumer electronics.

Brockian Ultra-Cricket

Over a discussion of 20-20 cricket, we were attempting to come up with some other ways to jazz up the game and make it more exciting. Some suggestions:
1. Combo bonuses for boundaries. For instance, the first six is worth six runs. If you hit another on the next ball, that's seven. A third would be worth eight.
2. Bonus runs for wearing less protective equipment. Super bonus points for carrying no bat.
3. Allowing fielders to tackle batsmen, and the batsmen to defend themselves. After all, they're already wearing spikes and carrying clubs.
4. Multi-ball! MULTI-BALL!

Mokalus of Borg

PS - It could get very interesting.
PPS - Or very silly. It's all good.

Not yellow, though

Looking at Jono (from Half Way Out)'s spiked mohawk on Saturday night, I thought it would be really cool to get one myself, only with the ability to fold it down and spike it up without my hands. You know, like a cockatoo's crest.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - The main difficulty would be the mechanics of it all.
PPS - I imagine some kind of pulley system attached to my eyebrows.

Did I really just say that?

Explaining some of our software to visitors from Melbourne:
"The business objects can also join together, like VOLTRON."

Mokalus of Borg

PS - Yeah, I need help.
PPS - Everyone together: "NEEEERRRRRRD!"

Kevins Smiths

I saw Dogma again last night (I've lost count how many times I've seen it now) and the one thing that always bugs me is the poor grasp of non-English plurals. For instance:
"I've had to put up with it for a millennia."
No, you haven't, see, because you can either put up with it for a millennium or many millennia. And the one that really gets to me is:
"I am a seraphim."
You are a seraph. What you just said is as crazy as saying "I am an angels".

Aside from this extremely nit-picky point, I do enjoy the movie almost as much as I hate/loathe/despise the type of person who talks as I watch it. Especially if they rationalise their behaviour as "I know I'm not supposed to talk, but it's really important that I point out right now that I've just noticed that's Jay and Silent Bob". I don't care. Nobody does.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - Occasionally I make threats to people like that.
PPS - They're usually empty, so they never sink in.

The greatest thing I have seen today

The Mozilla Thunderbird email client displays _textual_underlines_ as actual underlines! That is one of the coolest things I've ever seen.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - I bet it does /italics/ too.
PPS - I'll have to test it.

The Sunday Mok - So Long, And Thanks For All The Riffs

Last Sunday I was falling asleep in the morning church service due to a late night. I imagine I'll be doing that again today, for much the same reason. I hung out at Kirsty's place in the afternoon and also after the evening church service.
Going back to work on Monday was definitely a drag. Killing time for the entire week was not a good feeling, either. I know I achieved some things - I just felt like there should have been more of them. Netball in the evening.
More work on Tuesday and much the same feeling. It kept up all week. Karate in the evening and an early night. I wanted to stay awake more easily at work. I don't think I really achieved that.
On Wednesday I picked up Evil Genius and played it for a while. It's probably just the novelty factor that's leading me to spend more time on this game than my others.
On Thursday, when I got home from work, it was still light outside, so I went for a run. I've started carrying 2kg dumbbells because the 1kg ones were no challenge anymore. My time is still up around 37 minutes for my regular route, and I have not yet completed it carrying the bigger weights without slowing to a walk. When I can run the whole thing in 30 minutes or less, I upgrade weights again.
Friday night I spent hours playing Evil Genius, well into the witching hour. Had a timeslip - I kept going for just five more minutes several times. A party next door kept going until 02:40 with no music, just loud drunk-talk. At 01:00 I put in some earplugs which blocked out only my recognition of the words. I settled for that.
Saturday was the farewell GERALD gig (and I still don't know if they preferred their name written in all-caps, all-lowercase or one capital). After a few good bands (Half Way Out and Triple-07 were the best, IMO, and I heard Rest Assured's "Captain Planet" cover again), Gerald came on and played a set of probably 25 songs or so. If they started on time, they played for 2 hours, and I was up the front skanking the whole time. That's about the level of sophistication I can manage in dance: flailing and kicking around to the beat. This is probably why I love ska. I like Half Way Out too. They gave me a t-shirt.
Needless to say, after two hours of active dance, I was perspiring a little. We could have grown rice. It felt pretty darn good to change out of those clothes and get to bed. I saw many people there, too. My friends, some old schoolmates, friends and family of the band and lots of fans.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - It's a shame to see the band go.
PPS - Geographical pressures are fairly insurmountable in the music world, though.

Guess the Character!

I've had a bit of a play with this: Guess the Character! - See if the computer can guess which film/TV character you are! It's interesting, but it sometimes takes ages to get to the point. The first couple of times I tried it, I thought it was gradually honing in on the character, seeming to ask more specific questions. A few more tries later and it seemed to be floundering. The following characters were not listed when I tried them (and I didn't add them):

Lambert, the sheepish lion (from an old Disney short)
The nameless Jackalope from Pixar's "Boundin'"
Joan Gerardi from Joan of Arcadia

Mokalus of Borg

PS - I'm not sure if I've spelled Joan's last name correctly.
PPS - And I'm not positive I got her hair colour right when asked.

Gerald - Thats All Folks

The greatest ska band I have ever spoken to, Gerald, is breaking up and going out with a bang this Saturday. I'll be there, and I intend to party hard. If you're in Brisbane and are available, come along.

GERALD @ the Jubilee Hotel, Fortitude Valley
Saturday 15th January 2005, 8pm
Cover charge $10
Some other bands too.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - It's tragic, it really is.
PPS - I'm gonna miss being a groupie.

The Lukewarm Water Device

Our water heater here at home is about as old as me, and is now approximating my own ability to heat water above body temperature. That is to say that the thing is almost ready for retirement. Currently it produces just enough "hot" water for a disappointing shower, with none left over to wash dishes. One of those activities has to adapt, or the water heater has to be fixed. I'm guessing we will choose to live with it for a while, because Dad has this odd idea about home repair that says "if we don't fix it, we'll get used to it".

Mokalus of Borg

PS - I'll probably start boiling water on the stove to wash up.
PPS - The problem is that adds ten minutes to my morning routine.

Reality

It's possible that my grip on reality is a bit tenuous. Vampires, werewolves, zombies, giants, dwarves, elves, gnomes, superheroes, spaceships, pirates, ninjas, androids and Jedi populate my everyday world. To an extent, I know they're not real, but I often act as if they were. I attempt to use the Force to change traffic lights on a fairly regular basis. If I completely lose my grip, there's no telling what could happen, though it would possibly be less spectacular in real life than my imagination.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - Sometimes I try to harness this to write fiction.
PPS - Usually I end up with a dark, unfinished, very short story.

Angst. Sorry.

Usually I'd keep this kind of thing to myself, but it seems to be as good as anything else I'd post today. Last night I learned of a number of events planned by my friends to which I have not been invited. Part of the reason for that is surely that I have to work and can't afford much time at the moment. Still, I'd rather make those decisions for myself.

Let Me In

Over there in that bubble is where they
Can't hear me whisper
Can't hear me talk
Can't hear me scream
LET ME IN I cry in a voice
Too small to notice in the cacophony of silence
Unplug your ears
And show me where the door is
Let me at least stand outside in the rain
While you mock me
I'd rather that than be out here
Alone
Invisible
Silent
Take me with you when you go nowhere
Do nothing
Sit still
Let me follow you to the room full of white
Let me see you all together
Let me in
Let me in
Let me in.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - I still consider unmetered, unrhyming verse a copout.
PPS - It's quick and honest, though.

Apply nose (A) to grindstone (B)

Of course I don't feel like being back at work right now. I had to wake up two hours earlier than I have recently been accustomed to and my shirt has long sleeves and a collar. The Christmas decorations are still up around the office - so glad that's not my responsibility. There'll be a mountain of email to dispose of, which will probably take all morning, and the fact that I have friends in university who are still on holidays for another two months is really going to get to me this afternoon. Sigh.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - I'm really not in a foul mood.
PPS - It's just that a change of routine is too much to handle this early in the morning.

The Sunday Mok - 9 January 2005

Last Sunday was relaxing, as usual. After the evening church service some of us stayed behind to watch Stargate SG-1 DVDs until about 01:00. The rest of the day was sleep and City of Heroes.
On Monday I sun-bleached my hair a bit. I probably would have preferred it to come out a bit lighter than it did. People have yet to comment on it, which is probably because most of my friends have spent time at the beach recently, and their hair has also been lightened.
Tuesday I went shopping for a router, a gift and to get some old photos developed. The router story has been told already and the photos were less than spectacular. They seemed to be mostly opportunistic shots and film-wasters just to finish off the roll, spanning Easter to New Year. I don't take many photos. I bought Evil Genius for the gift, based on an Apropos of Something recommendation. I have since finished the demo and heard positive reviews from many other people. Now I need my own copy. Youthworx reunion also that night.
Wednesday was way too hot and humid to do anything but lounge in front of a fan. I went to Bridgit's to hang out with Stu and Murrae too, and play Party Monopoly. I lost first, which makes me some kind of winner, I think.
Thursday I went op-shopping with Stu and Bridgit for appropriate 80s costumes for Stu's 21st. I had mine sorted out already - I was just checking for cheap suits and hideous ties. I went back to karate in the evening for the first time in a few weeks and came home drenched with sweat. I blame the humidity for creating a zero evaporation rate.
On Friday morning I checked out the QFleet car auctions with Dad. The Toyota Camry I was interested in sold for $19 300, which is not surprising considering its good condition and low odometer reading. I played City of Heroes in the afternoon until Daniel and Lotte's farewell party, which I enjoyed. Of course.
Saturday I found out that the next time I'll see Vicki will be three weeeks from now, unless she calls me first. I'm going out on a limb and saying she's not gonna call. I went to Stu's 21st dressed as Freddy Krueger and was quickly surpassed by Murrae's full Darth Vader costume. We tried to convince Murrae (recently elected Elder at church) to wear the costume when he first distributes communion. He seemed less than receptive to the idea. Party pooper.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - I'm not quite looking forward to going back to work tomorrow.
PPS - Most of my time will be sorting out weeks of email.

In the Summertime

For the majority of you who live in Brisbane, this will hardly be news: Summer here is hot and humid 24/7. This feels like the biggest thing affecting my life right now. The heat and humidity combine to cover every person in a thin layer of perspiration and condensation, like an amphibian. The humidity means this does not evaporate like it should. It's tough to keep long hair in good condition. You feel like a set of gills wouldn't go to waste, since you practically swim through the air anyway. Also, because sweat smells bad and it isn't going away, it's almost impossible to smell good unless you live in air conditioning or stand in front of a fan all day and night. Personally I opt for three showers a day.

As bad as all this is, I imagine this is the only thing keeping the South-East Queensland population from exploding - others used to harsher Winters migrate North to tropical Queensland and experience the most pleasant Winter of their life. They move here. Summer rolls around and they melt like snowmen. So I guess it's not all bad.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - I go through 600mL of ice per night.
PPS - That's as well as the open windows and fan.

Dream Another Dream

I had a post all ready to go for this morning and then this dream hit me. I dreamt I was in bed very early in the morning and woke up with a strange compulsion to go downstairs and look out towards the ocean. I could see sparks flying into the air from a massive bonfire down on the beach (by the way, we don't live near the beach) and also some tiny pathetic fireworks. Then a bus - no kidding, a Council bus - comes flying through the air turning end-over-end and embeds itself up to halfway in the corner of the house. It barely missed my bed.

Of course by the time I checked around to see if anyone was playing a joke or wanted me dead, some of my friends had come over to see the bus. By then it had turned into a whale and I kind of lost my momentum.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - Just this morning I saw this which might at least explain where the idea of a flying bus came from.
PPS - I think it also had something to do with City of Heroes.

Routerised

I've just finished the minor headache of installing a router here at home to properly share our cable internet between two computers. I've restarted this computer about four times and rebooted the router maybe six times. I've had to check and change the internet password a few times, and more than once everything seemed to be working for about five seconds before it all fell down again. Now, however, everything seems to be up and running properly, and all the programs I've tested so far have worked without issue.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - I have yet to test the connection from the other PC.
PPS - I'm only a little worried about the new total of ten devices running on two power outlets in this room.

Stimulus/Response

I have made an observation of human behaviour. So far I have only observed this in females of the species, but it may equally apply to males. When a girl is just on the verge of entering a romantic relationship, she becomes way more friendly to everyone else, including people she might have avoided previously. I also have a couple of half-baked pop-psychology explanations:

• She may believe she is keeping the secret by behaving in a more friendly manner to everyone rather than just her prospective partner.
• Her system may be flooded with positive hormones, bringing about an involuntary goodwill to all people.
• She may (subconsciously) realise that she's about to drop out of many social circles for a little while, and is pre-emptively making up for it.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - Whatever the explanation, I have seen this to be true on a few occasions now.
PPS - I have yet to correctly interpret it as it happens.

"Useless" is such a harsh word...

It seems useful to me now, like many impractical ideas I've had before: an expiry date on files, emails, folders, whatever. That is, the file is slated for future deletion, but is intended to hang around until then. As I said, it seems useful, but I think it would be one of those features that gets buried in the background and used only a few times.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - I just want it so I can free up more of my memory for other important data.
PPS - Like more Simpsons episodes.

This is why I don't talk much

I carry a little black diary notebook in my back pocket everywhere I go. I use this notebook to keep track of appointments, taking names and occasionally to write down profound thoughts that strike me at odd moments. This, then, is my top 5 of those profound thoughts for 2004:

5: "If you think someone is boring, you don't know them well enough". This is probably just a reaction to me thinking I am boring.

4: "You can't dance and worry at the same time". True enough, eh?

3: "Every minute of every day we leave behind the person we once were. Change is not just inevitable - it is essential. Without change there is no growth. Without growth we cannot adapt. If we cannot adapt we spend more time trying to change our environment. Eventually all of our time is taken and we have none left to live in. The world will change whether you want it to or not. As long as you live here, you will have to make peace with change." This entry is notable because of its sheer length. It took a whole week's worth of pages to write down.

2: "I've learned that a baby's smile is the most infectious smile in the world". Everyone smiles when a baby does.

1: "Kung-fu Zombie Movie", referring to a half-baked idea about combining the two best movie genres of all time.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - There are many, many others.
PPS - Some of them belong on t-shirts.

The Sunday Mok - Bound and Rebound

Last Sunday, both church services were quiet. It seems that everyone's away right now. Bad Eggs has started to grow on me, after another viewing on Sunday night. I believe that's the fourth time I've seen that movie.
On Monday I saw The Incredibles and I invited just about everyone I knew via SMS, which probably cost me about as much as the movie ticket, in the end. One invited person came along and brought two other people, so that's probably the last time in ages that I try that.
I spent Tuesday mostly just reading and playing City of Heroes. We went to a family friend's place for dinner, and that's when I was invited to Rainbow Beach.
Wednesday was uneventful - reading, games, television, DVDs. All the really exciting stuff a hermit can do.
Thursday morning I left for Rainbow Beach and met the team, including New Girl, Vicki. By evening I was certain she was interested in me.
Friday morning Vicki was acting a little more distant. This led me to give her my number before I left, instead of asking for hers. I'm a little confused. I went to two New Year's Eve parties that were very different. I left one that comprised about nine laid-back people and arrived at the other in the middle of a rowdy, thirty-person game of Pass The Parcel.
Saturday after staying up to watch the first sunrise of the new year (as is my personal tradition) I slept in until 4pm. Not kidding. The rest of the day I played City of Heroes.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - It'll be at least a week before I get to see Vicki again.
PPS - And, of course, I can't call her.

New and improved!

I've just spent a few minutes updating my Blogger profile, because I had a new picture to use. Even though Dad owns a spiffy digital camera, somehow I have this aversion to actually using it to take a decent avatar picture of me. I just use whatever recent photo I get my hands on, like a digital photo scavenger.

Mokalus of Borg

PS - This particular one was taken in early December 2004.
PPS - I've only rarely been tempted to use a picture of Brad Pitt instead of me.