3 shots for a dollar win a real live doll

[13:22] griz: here are the test users that are being set up for clients to experiment with:
Test Users:First Name Last Name
Onesistest One
Twosistest Two
Threesistest Three
Foursistest Four
Fivesistest Five
Sixsistest Six
Sevensistest Seven
Eightsistest Eight
Ninesistest Nine
Tensistest Ten

Because things like Abraham Lincoln, King James, Pliny the Elder, and so on wouldn't be "appropriate"
[13:22] griz: And people might not figure out that they aren't REAL students.
[13:23] rev: I think they should all be Spartacus.
[13:23] griz: ROFLMAO
[13:23] griz: Damn. That is my new official name for everything. No more Phred.
[13:24] rev: Brian is an acceptable substitute, as Spartacus may be a little obscure for the young 'uns

It also just dawned on my that they misspelled systest in the fake usernames...

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Hey, we got power! Oh we got the soul

I have been catching up on the news now that power is back on. I see that NYC is up in arms over 100,000 being out of power last week (and many of them still without power). They are demanding the resignation of the CEO of the power company because of the massive impact this has had. They might not have noticed that here in St Louis in the same time frame about ten times as many people have been without power, and there are currently still ten times as many people without power as in NYC. But, you know, they are probably more important people. Right.

While I think Ameren has done a poor job handling the communication of plans and the local government officials have been vocal in complaining about this, I don't think anyone at Ameren should be losing their job over it.

Another thing in the news that's been driving me nuts is the hero worship of the National Guard people who came in to help. While I do appreciate their help and they've been pitching in nicely from what I've seen and heard, I think it is insulting to the city and county workers who've been working long hard hours since Wednesday evening. I can't speak much to the county experiences, but the St Louis City employees have done a tremendous job in this situation. Forestry and Streets in particular should be lauded for how quickly they've gotten the streets cleared and the hanging limbs down. I'm amazed at how much they've done in so little time in spite of the heat and in spite of many of them not even having time to get their own families relocated. Next time you see a Forestry, Streets, Water, Police, or Fire worker, go up and thank them.

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I got all the fuckin work I need

Some choice bits from the upgrade status meeting.

Network guru: Well then, why don't we just print the password on a bunch of t-shirts for everybody, then no one will forget it.

PM: Which certification instance should we be pointing at?
Reports Lead: The one with data in it.

Network guru: That's why I was doing that whole hosting.stlouis.mofo.funk thing on Friday

Network guru: Usually the turnover meeting happens before deploying to production, but we'll go with this
Me: Yea, well, usually certification deployment happens before production deployment too
Network guru: I was trying to ignore that

Note that we are changing: hardware platform, OS, skipping several versions of application server, upgrading db server version, switching reporting app server, and replacing cron with a scheduling suite. And coordinating it with 4 seperate business units. It's all going remarkably well, considering. We're in pretty good shape for the shape that we're in.

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What kind of guru are you anyway

Today I officiated at my first wedding. I did not say "By the power invested in me by the great state of Missouri", because it seemed a little to authoritarian for the mood of the event.

The lucky couple were married in the Chinese Garden at the Missouri Botanical Gardens. Really a beautiful location. The couple looked perfect together. I've known them both for a few years, and they really are a great match. I was thrilled and honored to be able to serve at their wedding.

I think I could have done a better job of coordinating the event and of directing the couple on where and how to stand, but there were no verbal flubs and no outbreaks of violence so I think it can be called a success.

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Nowhere to run to nowhere to hide

In spite of the skepticism of those who still have power, there really are no hotel rooms available within an hour of St Louis. Try searching expedia, or travelocity, or orbitz, or hotels.com. Try calling the local or national reservation numbers for any and all of the chains (which I've already done). Even the crappy places like Super 8 are booked solid.

The closest I've been able to find is Jefferson City.

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The shape of me

believe I've found the first printed references to the entire weblog phenomenon.



From The Shape of Me and Other Stuff. In 1973. As always, Seuss was ahead of his time.

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Senses working overtime

I'm a little confused at how XTC qualifies as Classic Rock. But that's what VH-1 seems to think. If more classic rock sounded like them, I wouldn't hate classic rock.

Peaches is plenty catchy, I'm wondering if her songs have any longevity however. I can certainly see gettnig bored with it pretty quickly.

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I don't know what it's like to be you

All the cool kids are doing it, so what the hell.

What were you doing 10 years ago?
Living in Hell A working for a Wall Street firm. I came very close to being a Gordon Gecko wannabe.

What were you doing 1 year ago?
Not sleeping enough.

Five snacks you enjoy
1. Fresh fruit
2. Dark chocolate
3. Peanut butter and celery
4. Red Vines
5. Sourpatch Kids

Five songs to which you know all the lyrics
1. Manic Street Preachers (yes, all of their songs)
2. Prince (probably only about 80% of his songs)
3. Faith No More (yes, all of their songs)
4. Adrian Belew (yes, all of them)
5. John Cage*

Five things you would do if you were a millionaire
1. Pay off debt.
2. Guitars. Lots of them.
3. Escape Hybrid.
4. Invest.
5. Educational trust for my kids.

Five bad habits
1. Easily distracted.
2. Overcommit.
3. Don't allow enough time for things.
4. Rush to judgement.
5. Lazy.

Five things you like doing
1. Spending time with my family
2. Playing guitar
3. Woodworking
4. Learning
5. Reading

Five things you would never wear, buy, or get new again
1. Parachute pants
2. Thong underwear
3. Microsoft Windows
4. Flowbee
5. expired food

Five favorite toys
1. iPod
2. iBook
3. Plunge base router
4. Tivo
5. Chisels


*That's a joke, son.

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You ain't got no deal at all

I've been doing a whole lot of DVD burning in the past few months, converting lots of old VHS tapes of concerts to digital, and I'm pretty bored with the iDVD themes. For such a popular software package there are surprisingly few add on packages with additional themes. And the few that I did find are surprisingly bad, especially considering what they are charging for them. Ugly ugly ugly designs and clip art quality graphics.

I haven't found any good articles on writing my own themes, but that looks to be my only option if I want more than what's included. In my copious free time...

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School's out forever

So it appears in that in a last ditch effort to stay in power, STL Public Schools Superintendent Creg Williams has Slay and a flunkie in Jeff City lobbying to get the school district's accreditation taken away so that he no longer has to answer to the school board.

If this is true, they are guaranteeing another wave of flight to the suburbs.

UPDATE: More details at pubdef. See also St Louis Schools Watch.

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I ain't got no job, but I got style

About half the women in the morning meeting had the big 80's hair going on. Seriously? That look wasn't attractive then, it's not now. Please stop. Back in the day it was just silly. On a 40 year old woman, it looks like someone's mom desperately trying to be hip. About two decades too late.

Which reminds me of something even stranger. There are two girls in their early to mid teens who get on the bus every morning. They look like they just stepped out of a Madonna video circa Desperately Seeking Susan. The headband, frosted hair, bangles, etc etc. And they have affected New York accents. They weren't even alive in that era, and no other kids look anything like that. I'm all for individuality and doing your own thing. I think it's great that they are willing to to take that kind of fashion risk. It's just bizarre to suddenly be transported back to high school for a moment every day.


Justin Timberlake: Sexy Back. Mediocre Neptunes production (or Neptunes rip off, dunno if they are actually involved in it). He's trying to do the deviant sexual riff that Britney did with Toxic or whatever song that was about being a slave. "I'm bringing sexy back." Because there has been a real dearth of sexiness on the charts for the past few years. The thing is: a song that seeks to 'bring the sexy back' should be sexy. Not tedious. Tedious is not sexy. Boring is not sexy.

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I wanna be in their trees

"There's a 10 to 15 percent chance that H5N1 will achieve escape velocity and mutate to be transmitted from human to human. If it does, between 100 million and 300 million people will die. The world will incur costs of $1 trillion to $3 trillion. But there's an 85 to 90 percent chance of it not happening. How do you think this through with a government that is anti-science?" - Larry Brilliant.

And this is the point I've been trying to make when people freak out over bird flu. It might become a problem, but it shouldn't be the number one priority for everyone given the relatively small risk.

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I'm about to punch yo lights out

92 degrees is harsh. I may need to try and figure out a time to go to the gym other than noon. Then again, it certainly gets my heart rate up.

On to more important. What the hell is it about people that walk slow that they need to get in your way as much as possible? This is particularly a problem getting on/off MetroLink, but even in the various office buildings I frequent I end up trapped behind someone in no particular hurry.

And these are not elderly people. I understand their limitations. These are not people hauling children with them, I understand that as well. I don't even mean groups of people that end up walking slowly. While that is annoying, I can generally make my way through them and they'll step aside if I say "pardon me".

I'm talking about able bodied, mostly healthy looking people in their 20's, 30's, and 40's. Whether they are dressed trailer or Ladue doesn't seem to matter. People who are not only slow, but walk in the middle of the hallway or walkway, and *don't move out of your way when you say 'excuse me'*. That is what drives me nuts.

Me getting to my desk 1-2 minutes late is no big deal. Me missing my connecting bus and being 40 minutes late because some idiot couldn't be bothered to move over 14 inches is a big deal. To me. I realize they don't care.

I've stopped being nice about it. Someone is in my way, I don't even pause. I'll barrel through. I say 'pardon me', and I might even try not to bump into them. Maybe. But I'm not so overloaded with free time that I'm interested in wasting any of it because some idiot is dawdling.

Totally unrelated: Heard the Paris Hilton song. She has a decent voice (or the production work made it sound good) but the only thing more boring than reggae is faux-reggae.

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