too much to say

so no more posting this week. but i've happily arrived in a perfect place and i've touched snow for the first time. i'm happy ^_^

i suffer from...

... D2 receptor reduction, apparently.

hmmph - it completely slipped my mind that elon musk grew up in south africa.

"could wipe out dengue fever" - or mosquitoes in general? i'm happy with the latter.

group nuke hunting seems like a good idea. why do i hear the "i'm doing my part" bit from starship troopers in my head?

assuming that it's a fair suggestion, we might have a chance. also assuming that nuclear holocaust, rogue asteroids and plagues don't wipe us out first.

back to packing. i discovered that my withdrawal limit is larger than i thought - good to know. i think i need to fix that. i exchanged NIS for euros, and came away with more than i expected... enough to not need to borrow from the kid. a little less stress :)

high tone kicks ass with delicious dub.

back to shopping

this is frustrating: i don't feel so good.

i finally finished watching the first resident evil last night - WOW. totally gripping and thrilling.

we went out with some guys from our old team, and although it was all good i was absolutely exhausted, i began passing out around 1am (we only got home around 3am) and have been feeling wasted since.

i just got back from the post office: i now have firefly: the complete series and serenity - all good :)

so there's going to be an american mcgee's alice movie. there may be stops and starts, so here's hoping the rides less bumpy and isn't too long.

i found a link to some of the game artwork - it's near the bottom of the page. excellent stuff.

organized and excited

the kid got his passport sorted out this morning, and hearing that released the flood of emotion and excitement that i'd walled back out of fear of a lack of materialization. now we're going - WE'RE ACTUALLY GOING!!

i spent the day hard at work, and met my targets with a half an hour to spare for tidying up my desk and making sure to leave with a clear conscience. and the work was fun.

lunch was surprisingly good too - all our complaints during the last week must have been heard... well, even if it was only for a day it was nice.

high hopes - but the idea of skipping the crowded elevator in such a cool way...

WOO boy. i can see some barrel-scrapers having a go at this.

do i care what you think of me?

well, i'm supposed to. but i don't. not really. i was subjected to a review today that included two points i don't entirely agree with my commanders on, and for the rest i was completely apathetic.

the first is that i have a temper, but i knew that. what bothers me is that they actually don't, they've seen me frustrated with word and other stupid things / occasional people, but i haven't come close to losing my temper in the office. and nobody else seems to have any issues with me on that score, so i don't have a clue where it comes from.

the second is that i'm disappointed that they don't see me as fit to be a team leader... yet. what does that mean?

i did manage to get our SC off my case about working late, though. that's a good thing.

i finally managed to get the jerk who's always on my case about music in the office to understand that i'm not the only one listening. we had a civil discussion and then he stopped being a jerk. or became less of one, remains to be seen. unfortunately there aren't any solutions that will satisfy everyone.

err... i worked a lot today. and loved it. there's a big difference between the states of "challenging" and "frustrating", and when it's the former it's fun.

i can't decide if i like jethro tull or not.

my dvd's have arrived! i can collect on friday morning ^_^

nasty bastards - riaa and mpaa being pathetic

even nastier bastards - religious radicals being pathetic... but then again, who are these idiots who are stupid enough to discuss freedom of speech as if it's a right that exists over there?!

music tax - trent reznor's idea has potential, but needs refinement

spaceshiptwo is getting there!

forgotten

getting a ride to base from one of my section-mates means leaving my apartment half an hour later than usual and arriving on base half an hour earlier. this is working for me.

sorting grimy bottles for recycling, in the rain, is a bit of a chore. it's frustrating when some idiot spends all his time taking photos of us doing it that nobody cares about instead of helping us get through it all faster.

coming up with conniving reverse-practical jokes is amusing.

the girl working at aroma remembered my name - we think she likes me.

the boss came in to my office around 7pm and offered me a ride home. when i told him i was staying a bit longer he politely insisted on me leaving. i politely replied that i was getting a ride with one of the other guys, and he suggested that i confirm this in case i'm forgotten.

i suspect foul play - i didn't confirm because the guy giving me a ride usually gives me a ride. i received a phone call half an hour later asking me if i was still on base, he'd already hit tel aviv. wonderful.

at least i found someone else to give me a ride.

i'm going to bed early tonight, i've just played around successfully with SDL and that's enough computing for me.

contact lenses again, with pretty pictures

paper spacecraft

in-game medical degree

apparently this man has a solution to some of our problems.

coffee break broken

i need caffeine to operate.

we trained this evening, just running but running seriously. then we shopped on the way home... i was all sweaty, enough time passed, and now i'm chafing. i'm not a happy camper.

my day had a relaxed start, visiting another base and even managing to stay alert during a long, boring speech.

the kid's didn't, but he's been told his passport will be sorted out by thursday. which is the last possible date before we leave, so no pressure there. it's not clear what could take them so long, they can do the damn thing in twenty minutes. i think it's personal.

high tone is grand. grand, grand, grand.

the work i got done this afternoon / evening was enjoyable.

here endith the summary of the day. i'm all tuckered out.

jabbering on

we spend a hell of a lot of time talking about doing work, discussing how much pressure we're under, and it's beginning to feel like we're focused more on the amount of work sitting on our plate than we are on reducing it.

i was still out of it today, and in a desperate bid for the return of my ability to function i consumed two cups of coffee and lots of sugar during the day. and my bid paid off - just after calling it a night my brain reactivated, and i'm feeling much better.

no chips for me this morning, meetings, re-education, a long shopping trip, dinner, and then i could actually begin to sit down and work... apparently quite a large portion of the work that i've *just* completed (and haven't stopped complaining about) will have to be redone in a just-not-similar-enough format.

discovered today that the kid's passport's problematic... that's a wonderful thing to find out when we're leaving in five days. buggrit.

i seem to have gotten over my initial horror, two girls one finger and four girls fingerpaint didn't freak me out completely. if you haven't seen any of the videos, do yourself a huge favour and DON'T.

i've begun reading the first clive barker - books of blood instalment. i've bought the registration package for the psychometric exams. these two pieces of information are completely unrelated.

i hear flight of the conchords in the lounge, so i must go.

today's calvin & hobbes rocks

tired of the weekend

the remainder of the weekend was a bit weird, and the bus ride back sucked utterly due to a stuck-open window and i suspect that the engine's muffler was stolen. an hour and a half of high-pitched and loud whining hurt.

but i do have tickets... both for next week's snowboarding, and for my trip to south africa for easter. excellent!

now to shower and crash.

you're wearing contact lenses!

catapult - a modern geek's tale

deterministic darwinism, badly titled

i hate it when journalists tell us we've learned lessons. his is speculation at best and i'm sure there's a better model nobody's thought of yet.

wordlist - very important, you will be tested on this one.

tiny UAVs, small like - like very small things. i kinda see these prototypes going off like released balloons, though.

can anyone explain to me why people forward hoax mails without checking the snopes link included in them??? assholes.

*still* fumbling

and i came empty-handed, only coming up with the perfect gift when i was already here. next time.

traveling was alright... except for one detail. i didn't bring any books thinking that i'd just listen to my ipod, whose battery died as i hopped on the bus. swak.

i was given a huge lunch, all my cousin's kids are here which is great, dinner was a big to-do, and now it's chill / bed-time. i definitely need to sleep more.

lipgirl - metalhead confusion

the kid and i both passed out watching flight of the conchords, then shuttled to the lizard to pay the boys a visit. the mongoose told me that the bar i was so impressed with last week was shutting down, so the kid and i took a hike in that direction, with him educating me about graphics manipulation on the way.

during the chat i came up with a solution to my current SDL problem, and he *just* walked into my room to propose the exact same thing! alright! identical independent solution!

so we arrived at the bar to discover that it's far from shutting down :)
and ran into lipgirl and her friend, which was funny as hell - in recent months' posts i've been confusing her with metalhead (okay, so i forget nicknames, i forget real names too), an unfortunate girl i dated for a couple of weeks a long time ago. i'll have to go through fixing a bunch of posts now :(

we had a fun time, took a taxi back, and at 3.15am went shopping. fine, we'd both had a bit to drink, but the supermarket at that time of the morning is brilliant! no old people, no queues, all the products are available for friday morning mayhem, so we had an interesting breeze-through before coming home to pass out.

i'm now off to the kibbutz to pick up tickets and chill... it's a bummer that i only remembered this morning that it's my cousin's birthday :S [maybe i'll get her some chocolate]

still a bit off

so this is the kid's gift, on 50x70cm canvas (without the disclaimer) that's now perched above his bed.
so awesome ^_^

the thing is, when i went to the store on friday to organize it, i handed the dvd over and i got a puzzled look in return.
"are you sure?"
"why?"
"'cause it's sized 50x70mm..."

the store-owner then explained this wonderful thing called the - i think i got this right - the intar-nets, and told me i could just have sent the file by email. during this week i discovered that my machine's barely capable of the graphics processing demanded by such a large, high quality pic.

i went to work today... but i definitely haven't gotten back to 100% yet. it took hours to get through the mail, lunch was disappointing (i called in a complaint, then got harrassed by the catering company's representative for it), the new guy seems alright and my current job totally sucks.

when i got back i watched national geographic's fight science documentary on a tip-off from dirk diggler, which was a brilliant call. anyone who doesn't want to be a ninja after that...

it's the kid's birthday, but i'm so damn tired i dunno if going out is such a good idea...

like i like my coffee

^{yeah, i know what i did wrong with this picture, and i've learned from my mistake.}

d-damn. rob zombie's halloween 2007 is gorgeous! i like his movies as much as i like his music :D

i spent some time having nuts flung at my by SDL - i just can't seem to control the colours the ways i'd like. everything's so damn simple, but i can't see the wood for the trees yet. or at least, the squirrels in the trees flinging the nuts.

i've been listening to a lot of within temptation, and aside from a few songs i just can't get into it. it's pleasant ambient stuff, but it's not something i could get excited about.
dredg comes to mind with regards ambience, but dredg has a decent percentage of gripping segments. within temptation is merely nice.

i can't believe that tomorrow's the end of the working week. i can't believe that i spent it in such a miserable manner, and that spending it that way makes my job that much harder. i understand the role disease plays in our world, i just believe that people with real deadlines should be exempt from it... or allowed to postpone with no additional penalties imposed.

yes, yes. i'm a cruel, bitter person. cold, too.

it's a bit messy

i've been sick for a week, and i'm not quite fully recovered. i woke up about 3am shivering and sweating, checked my temperature and found it to have returned to a warm and cozy 35.5.

i look around at my room - what feels like my neglected life - in horror, knowing that there's a million things to tidy up and sort out and that tomorrow it's back to business as usual, even if i'm not 100% yet.

i made it for blood tests this morning, and found out that i would've made it yesterday, too. they operate until half past ten. the girl who stuck me did so aways to the side of my arm, which confused me greatly. never seen that before.

i mean, i guess she could stick me just about anywhere to draw blood, no?

the obliquely referred to mistake correction story came to a successful conclusion afterwards :)
in addition, i was treated to a quick review of starcraft - the board game, which sounds really good.

i remembered what i loved about pick of destiny yesterday - ben stiller was absolutely brilliant! guitar center guy is a character that definitely needs his own feature :)

i took on the mantle of compound suffering in going to the city council to be bled for municipal tax, fight with the elderly and get my resident's card replaced. then i did some shopping (the whole roast chicken was good, the apples are good, the doughnuts are good... pity the damn carrots are gross) before settling in to watch house of 1000 corpses.

house of 1000 corpses is an absolutely wonderful movie - it just bumped the cell down my favourites list of most aesthetic and artistically disturbing movies. great fun!

this - this is just beautiful. *sniff*
xkcd is almost always great, but this is how *i* feel when hit with a segfault. i now feel untold compassion for my executable.

low powered

i watched the big damn documentary yesterday, and immediately bought the series and movie from amazon. i almost feel bad for not having done so before, but a late show of appreciation is better than never, right?

i slept much better last night, after passing out around 4am at the end of gulliver's travels (first time i've seen the whole thing). unfortunately, i slept so well that i bypassed my alarm and woke up at 9.55am, too late to make the blood tests.

today i watched the pick of destiny, which was cute. there's something i really loved in the movie, but i've since completely forgotten what it was.

i followed it up with disney's alice in wonderland. i found one striking quote that i've never noticed before: tweedle-dee and tweedle-dum offering to play a game of "button, button, who's got the button?" with alice. i'm only familiar with the game from go ask alice...

i spent most of the day reading serenity - those left behind, sinfest, phd and megatokyo - it would take me many more sick days to catch up but i'm quite comfortable doing it in bits and pieces.

my appetite's slowly returning, but the kitchen's power's out which makes it a tad complicated to prepare food :(
[why didn't i think of moving the appliances to another room before? *rushes off and discovers that the power's back on anyway*]

i corrected for the mistake i made on friday, so tomorrow while i'm out being bled i'll close that story as well :)

a friend of a friend accidentally let slip that i have a new team member, and shortly after my TL called me and i had to hint it out of him... then my SC called to inform me that he only noticed today that i haven't been around :P

a few weeks ago i sent out a request for everyone in the section to bring things for a group breakfast, which was to occur yesterday. being sick i figured that they'd lame out and wait for me, but i'm quite happy to have heard that it was done and enjoyed ^_^

bit of the internet, captured for you:

some screenshots and a totally rocking half-hour demo video for the upcoming game spore. looks completely awesome.

no need for extras - quite an impressive trick

i can only think of one word for this one: douchebag.

the pooch from sinfest doesn't stop making me smile :)

my worst nightmare

i can't believe it got worse. i can't remember anything worse than the experience i had trying to sleep last night. i've spent a few days unable to eat, sleep, or breathe comfortably, and the chills and the hot flushes, feinting this morning and once again going in the wrong direction to get to the clinic (in reverse, this time) just made it all worse.

i've got another couple of days off, i really hope that's enough.

yesterday afternoon was relatively alright, though - i spent it canning myself while watching flight of the concordes, a stunning series and i'm disappointed that i'm through the entire season already.

last night, just before getting up and turning off the music, i had a dream reminiscent of tool - rosetta stoned, only i keep a pen and paper handy.

the only thing wrong with humans is that they persist in their attempts to define general rules and moral codes for things that simply cannot be governed by them - specifically themselves.

the more people believe these rules and codes to be correct the less human they become.

woozingly done

and here i thought i was getting better. last night the kid and i rented the zodiac, a great movie, and i went to bed feeling alright.

this morning my nightmare began, i couldn't sleep from about 7am, and until 6pm i couldn't get out of bed without feeling nauseous and feint. i tried eating, that didn't go so well, and i lay in bed either shivering or sweating.

today sucked.

when i eventually could get out of bed and took a much-needed shower, i decided that the best course of action was to head on down to the city officer to have myself checked out.

the good news is that the new clinic is much easier for me to get to from home (one bus), the bad news is that i had to get all the way to the old one to find that out. luckily i was (still am) wearing two pairs of pants, but it was still a very cold walk.

the new clinic was crowded but we were dealt with fairly quickly. i hate the fact that most israelis just don't get the whole covering-your-mouth-when-you-cough thing. some of them give a symbolic half-raise of the arm, but in general not even that.
a couple of hours later i walked out with two days of sick leave in hand, which is a bit of a bitch because tomorrow was supposed to be a big day for me at work.

i just spoke to my mum, and am ready to get back to bed.

the gizmodo guys are real assholes. only slightly better than the polish jerk.

this is similar to an idea i had years ago - this is what happens when somebody with cash is listening. everyone i spoke to told me i was being an idiot.

woven speakers? i'm still having difficulty with the kids ghetto-blasting their cellphones.

if ever there was a case for evolution not being valid, these bumpkins are it.

if trent's disappointed, i'm disappointed.

belated post-concert, now post-coccoon

first item: the eatliz performance. i know now that their name means "abattoir". for anyone who's missed my previous impressions, they're an art rock group with simply fantastic ideas. and until wednesday night i hadn't actually noticed how much their songs have tunnelled into my head.

the eerie power of a band that sounds identical live to their studio-recorded album while maintaining such a high level of emotion was simply awesome.

aside from a bunch of new material that we were treated to, they had a jamming session that was surreally synchronized. it was disappointing that the experience had to end, and a bit odd that i was still going to be in bed in time for the following workday.

the club itself is great - it's underground with incredible sound, although the lighting caused the band to prove themselves on a number of occassions when everything went suddenly pitch-black.

upstairs is a bar out of futuristic noir, and they're purists meaning that anyone sitting down in sitting down to drink. they have decent live performances every night, so i'll definitely be visiting there more often.

my thursday morning post-concert wake-up was quite tardy, but i managed to get to base at the usual time in spite of the too-much-guinness-induced cotton wool in my head. unfortunately, for the second day in a row, the guy selling slap chips and i were out of synch, and i had to go without in spite of sNv being exactly what i needed.

after a number of weeks of waiting those of us who ordered finally received unit shirts. after my last experience with long-sleeves i expected them to be comfortable, warm and elastic enough to roll up quickly. the horrid-sleeved shirts we received proved to be quite the opposite, to the point where later on i didn't feel bad using one of them as an impromptu towel.

on the flip side of the release coin for the soldier i mentioned on wednesday, we talked over lunch about the perfect (and perfectly mean) gift. we had such fun with the idea that we couldn't stop laughing, and suddenly one of the mess-hall staff rocked up and asked if we could please stop enjoying ourselves because other people were waiting to be seated.

superb.

i had my hair cut by the new hairdresser, the first female practitioner i've seen in the army. she's not very good although she did me something passable, but i have to admit that it's the first time in years that i wasn't happy about having my hair trimmed. yesterday specifically it was simply splendid, and rather symbolic of a level of freedom that i'm not due for a very long time.

a few of us worked late yesterday, and i discovered that nystire (who's my project's primary resource) has apparently returned to working with me... without informing me. so he managed to waste a workday and the next couple of weeks are going to be rough time-wise anyway. i really expected a little more maturity than that, in spite of his being a right jerk the last while.

i caught the pointy-haired boss for a little chat regarding project limitations, and reminded him again that i'm going to be on holiday in a couple of weeks.
so? that's not a problem.
i'll be in france.
who authorized your taking vacation??
YOU did. and i've been reminding you ever since the deadlines were redefined
can't you defer it a little?

NO. we've been planning this snowboarding trip for ages, you need to book well in advance, and we're NOT deferring it. i'm praying that he now understands that if i say we might experience future difficulty with something that he should probably pay attention instead of giving me the "it'll be fine" line.

the bus i took back home was similar to that scene in invader zim - walk of doom. all the characters come out (or in) when the weather's miserable.

i discovered when i arrived home that my chequebook is invalid. i only ever pay attention to it when rent is due... so i defaulted on the rent payment and will have to get organized on monday. our landlord seemed in good humour about it, but i feel awful about the whole deal.

for almost four hours singer and i sat working on her cv. i wasn't expecting to need more than twenty minutes to finish it up, and we just kept running into problems. i was stressed out and already not feeling too hot, and when she eventually left i just passed clean out.

i wasted an hour or so on moo card designs this morning, and i'm completely unsatisfied with the results.

this morning i was stupidly freezing cold because i childishly couldn't bear wearing anything over my new penny arcade shirt on its first time out. the chilly twenty minute walk to the center, hopping from sunbeam to sunbeam unhelpfully, was an unnecessary mistake. i went to check something out and had brought the wrong thing (i might have a better explanation in a couple of weeks).

i walked into the disc center and bought the two alter bridge discs by quickly greeting the guys but not giving them a chance to talk :)

i frozen-meat-popsicled my way to meet with the kid for a great breakfast, although sitting outdoors after walking cold was not a good idea. after quick shopping, i got into bed and shivered fitfully until just before 6pm. i still have a headache but at least i've managed to turn the external aircon on.

singer introduced me to a band called ozric tentacles (not osric testicles - singer couldn't figure out why i wasn't taking her seriously when she tried to find one of their videos).

i'm trying to decide if i'm going to send fn a message - i haven't spoken to her since last week, and that's unusual for someone i'm sleeping with... unless we're no longer doing the bad thing. i'm a bit ambivalent myself, you see.

my head aches.

*cough*
*HACK*
*spit*

C-C-Captured and F-F-Falling

two things just happened to me about twenty-five minutes ago, just as tool - lateralus came on after listening to their discography in order from the very beginning.

1) my internal air-conditioning was suddenly and immediately restored
2) i was staring unfocused at the piece of paper i've been scribbling on at random intervals today, and i watched as the letters transformed themselves into strange symbols - an inspirational piece of waking fever-dream that caught my mind's eye and let me watch the words forming into a spiral, then a whirlpool, slowing twirling into a deep abyss down through my bed.

captured

ceiling cement to your cold corpse and carriage
coiled up carefully in your crystal coccoon
post cerebral cunning and complex creations
confined callously, clear of our complicated cartoon

your concrete connoisseur's conviction now careless and carefree
contemplating conniving calculators creeping about

cleft by certainty

cloaked in credulity

you cannot call out
you're to cross the crevasse
while we carry on without


falling

fermenting then festering
forgotten and fetid
through folly folded, though fully frequented
frightful fallacy forged that just could not hold fast
furrowed features frozen on your felled face
flickering, flashing feral fleet of flocking
to fall out your forehead and forever down

begrudged and impatient

i *hate* having to control myself and not punch that little bastard's teeth out, no matter how well-trained i am. via email he continued to taunt me and talk a bunch of crap this morning, possibly thinking we're playing a game. i've shut him off and ignored everything that's come from that direction since, but it made for a bad start to an aggravating day.

and he's not alone in this. we have a couple of what i like to think of as "jerk groups" forming - at least it's not too many people all in all, but it's annoying that there's a bunch of people i'm serving with that i'm trying to have as little to do with as possible. maybe i've just been around the new guys long enough to have begun identifying the assholes.

i'm reading justina robson - selling out, the sequel to keeping it real, and a primary point for one of the character sets is [surprise!] being true to oneself. but what if i'm aware that i'm really an asshole and i don't like myself? in that case what sort of behaviour can be defined as being true to myself?

how's that for mental masturbation? in any event, i've personally got another few years to go before i can even think about being true to myself. and people wonder why i'm frustrated all the time.

my SC provided two points of inspiration today:

1) i have to give a speech, and he made a quick joke about me doing it all in english. i'm seriously considering it, just to freak out the intended audience before switching to hebrew

2) one of the guys in our section's being released, and he made a comment about potential gifts that got me to thinking, and now i'm trying to convince the guy to go ahead and do it for real

alter bridge kicks ass, and i feel like kicking my own for not having bought the albums.

and a bunch of interesting news, then i'm off to an eatliz concert with singer. i need a drink.

SWIR pretty

good green idea - solar powered phone and ipod charging

ospreys - not so bad, then?

90 times? sounds like the new hubble will provide even better wallpapers

i haven't seen this yet, but i've heard that it's worth watching. this is a pre-emptive "cool!" because i don't really want to post again tonight.

wired magazine: now that i've subscribed to the treeware version, i find it difficult to browse the site on principle...

post-meeting and sushi

some quick links before crashing:

"i don't know" is no excuse for disclaiming evolution

finally, science drops the vaccination => autism thing

little tortilla boy

flight of the concords tell very, very important stories.

bearing the grudge

half pint. i can't get away with calling him anything else. he's quite the dick - the idiot with the eating disorder.

he made organizing joining the birthright festivities a real bitch yesterday, and i've been disliking him more the more i've noticed how much crap he talks. this afternoon, while i was busy having a hefty bag of bad news laid on me by the professor, he came and stood right behind my elbow.

i made the national sign for "give me a moment" with the hand that wasn't holding the cellphone, and he promptly drew out the twenty he owed me and began rustling it in my ear. i was trying desperately to concentrate on what i was being told, and i really didn't want to interrupt the professor as everything he's done for me has been a huge favour - i angrily shoved half pint away and picked up the thread as best i could.

a bit later i received an email from his commander demanding that i apologize for using violence on his soldier when he was "only trying to do me a kindness by returning my money". i angrily and impolitely explained to him that his soldier leaving me alone was totally worth that money before firing an email back to both of them letting them know that his behaviour was unacceptable. i'm still pissed off about it, though. he's really been getting under my skin... like scabies. [it ties in, sort of]

as for the bad news: in the same way that my unit commander made it abundantly clear that my experience wasn't worth anything, the professor regretfully informed me that the degree i have actually decreases the chances of my being accepted to engineering. so it looks like i'm going to have to do the israeli high school diploma and the israeli equivalent of the SATs. fantastic.

that all kinda puts a damper on my day. speaking of damp, the kinder and i missed the first bus to base this morning from jerusalem, and arrived at the beginning of the twenty minute walk to base exactly as the downpour began. stopping for sNv chips didn't give us enough of a breather (or a dryer, or whatever), and by the time i got into the office i was so incredibly glad that i just happened to have a change of clothing available...

it was a nice walk and all, but my bag's still soaked and i ruined my notebook with a bunch of sketches and poetry. i managed to rescue most of it, and had to set the pages individually all around my workspace until they dried :P

work was awesome today - i had one of those moments of glory that i'm extremely happy my TL was around to witness ^_^
just remembering it makes me feel better: a while ago i theorized something and i finally put it into action, working smooooothly :)

the army hostel we stayed in last night in jerusalem is excellent compared to those i stayed in at the start of my service. hot water, air-conditioning, and our group didn't have to share a room with anyone... the only thing that sucked was the paranoia of acquiring scabies from the blankets... [told you]

jerusalem is COLD.

the mega event:
a) going to a mega event when not part of a birthright group just isn't the same.
b) jason from mtv still stinks.
c) gaia just isn't in the same league as shotei ha'nevu'a (fools of the prophecy)
d) no alcohol served this time.
e) the music was painful. the last one i was at was great, fun israeli music and trance and it was outdoors. this was bad hip-hop that you can find anywhere in the world, and it was confined indoors.

i can't really recall much of yesterday, aside from a long, uninteresting meeting and a really funny conversation that i had with someone while trying to explain to them that the information bar in internet explorer needs to be removed.

i've had alter bridge - coming home in my head for two days now, that alone makes it worth the planned purchase.

linkage:

15 - 20 years waiting isn't great, but being able to recycle CO₂ is! by then they could attach it to the airships that are coming back into fashion.

just another tease?
just another possible birthday present?

transfer complete - this is nice tech with tons of potential uses.

at least it shouldn't be possible to accidentally fry the ground crew... theoretically.

QA is really not my bag.

four and a half hours of my life wasted today on quality assurance lectures. suck.

the actual work i got around to doing was great, though. and with a little bit of inattentiveness i managed to make it challenging, too. i was a bit distracted with organizing a bunch of things, one of those things being a place to stay tomorrow night on assumption that a few of us are going to jerusalem for a party - j-girl's willing but i think i'll stick with ru55 :P

i got home to find a package waiting for me: PENNY ARCADE - YOU ROCK!! the shirt is awesome!

back from training: i'm not fully recovered yet. also, i've a small tear in my left leg from my last tkd session, and i'm praying it's not infected 'cause it hurts like hell and we're off snowboarding in a couple of weeks :S

we just did a quick shopping run, and i confronted one of the aisle managers about their constant lack of lactose-free vanilla-flavoured kiddie-milk. he went back and hauled out a few crates, and told me that in future if i don't see on the shelves to just ask.

WTF?! it's obviously popular enough that people are buying them up as soon as they appear... this is a tactic reminiscent of our mess hall in the evenings. there's no bread until the majority of soldiers give up and leave, then suddenly there's too much. bastards.

even prisoners get bread. speaking of which, the palestinian prisoners in israeli jails get fed better than we do. again, suck.

now i'm after a quick shower (nothing better in winter than hot water tickling one's scalp), supper (an entire focaccia stuffed with meat, goat's cheese and cucumbers), and i'm going to crash before getting ready for the next two days.

swordfish

inspiration leads to SDL. and SDL is awesome.

most of yesterday was consumed by sleep and trawling the web. then we watched swordfish, and i immediately jumped online and discovered SDL...
and then late last night fn arrived...

after watching national geographic, the endings to both gulliver's travels and sonny and cher this morning, i went back to SDL hacking, having given fn terry pratchett - truckers to keep her occupied :)

SDL is impressive both in linux and windows (although the kid's working on something along different lines), and much amusement ensued when i managed to lose my mouse and scrunch up my resolution hopelessly - the code i tried to fix it with i ingeniously placed in a non-occurring condition. what an amateur!

the last thing i expected was a call from the mongoose to invite me to his new club. he actually bought the lizard, along with freshmeat and another friend of his, after years of managing the place - the first thing i did was tell him urgently "quick! give it back!" :P

the kid made dinner, and the three of us settled in to watch the golden child, which was great!

i walked fn to the bus, then took a different one to get to the lizard. i like what they've done to the place, they've got their shit together, a decent crowd and good music, a drop-dead gorgeous bartender and passion fruit available, so we made the new year official by bringing our suitcases.
well, it was whiskey and not jack, but close enough.

on the way back home i had plenty of time to think about what i'm doing with the swordfish-inspired work... i don't know how long it'll take because i simply can't prioritize it highly and it's a big project, but i have some styling ideas in the pipeline and i reckon i'll eventually get something useful out. heh, i'll call it f.

i'm not sure how wise it is to be sleeping with a seventeen year-old parolee with a body built for sin and a smile to match. i mean, i've been towing the line with everything else, should i really be indulging myself this much?

YES.

-- ooh! almost forgot all the links! --

does it matter if we're VR? yet another matrix theory, unless somebody has devised a method to exit to the "real" reality it would be wiser to direct our efforts to the problems at hand.

a healthy scientific retort, posted in the midst of a discussion of just how impressive it is that the rovers lasted so long.
and how silly it is that they don't have solar panel wipers.

the reconciliation of science and religion... is just as believable as pre-historic chariots of fire and flying mountains.

why - oh why - do we have to wait until next fall?!
preview
goosebumps
tingly feelings

brief sleep respite

another pointer to the dawn of a new era - the notion of pervasive armed-drone presence policing in addition to military action is actually rather titillating. [this is addition to a previously posted link]

i definitely watch too many movies. speaking of which, i tried to watch beowulf last night. i don't know if it's because i was so tired or because it was such a long, slow movie... i didn't make it. not even close.

i've spent a couple of waking hours catching up and taking out the trash, now i'm going back to bed.

sNv

i overslept this morning, and took the wrong bus from the central station - i arrived more or less on time anyway, though.

thing is, as soon as i stepped off the bus something hit an olfactory nerve, and suddenly the idea of salt and vinegar chips became my core reason for survival. good thing for me that the random stand five minutes walk away where i usually buy a quick 'n dirty breakfast sells slap chips...

the shock the man behind the counter registered when i asked him for vinegar was nothing in comparison to his wife's, whose squeals of "what the hell would you do that to chips for" and weird noises about chefs and culinary genious weren't going to put a damper on my spirits [had to] after it had been raised by the mere possibility of actualization.

those chips made for one of the best breakfasts i can recall in a long, long time. that will not be the last time i do that.

good thing i was in a good mood, because we had an extremely long meeting this morning. another positive was good munchies being provided, so i could focus more on pretzels and cake than the boring stuff... but we went straight to lunch afterwards, which was a bit much.

the afternoon was good, productive, and in the midst of it all i received a phone call from the professor - he gave me news that - while not ideal - yields hope, and that's more than i anticipated.

tool's not good for my headspace - i've been listening repeatedly for a long time and each song (well, the serious ones at least) drags me off emotionally from this reality, removes me to an identical zone in which i don't want to do anything more than contemplate my navel.

essentially the pink floyd effect, but deeper.

the reason i'm so addicted is that i can't simulate that level of emotion when my mind's focused on the real world. i just don't care enough.

pre-bed linkage:

small asteroids are dangerous too. NOW they tell us.

you don't need $5k speakers. but you don't want tinny ones either.

lego alternative - can i remodel myself with this?

pocket projector, the next little purchase

now that i'm feeling so good about penny arcade, i'm thinking either the rumble poster or the cardboard samurai...

all's well that...

Thanks for writing. I apologize for taking so long to get back to you. I've gone ahead and created a reshipment of the correct shirt for you and we'll send it with FedEx International Economy so that it will get to you much faster. Also, don't worry about returning the girl's shirt, perhaps you know someone who would like it? We appreciate your support.

after all that - penny arcade's merch dept. rocks!!

the other correction that just took place involves singer faxing the cover sheet that i'd intended to send with my grades to the professor, because i wasn't focused and i accidentally sent the half-finished draft sheet instead.
how embarrassingly blind.

one thing's for certain, regardless - the next academic course of action for me is not going to be trivial.

i spent the morning clearing out the mass of emails that somehow managed to collect in only two days, and the rest of the day working at a fairly steady pace and clearing a couple of major hurdles by 8pm.

the highlight of the work-day was without any doubt beginning it by being extremely firm with our SC after being informed that he was taking away more resources from my main project when we're already encroaching on our deadline. i explained to him in no uncertain terms that this would be the second deal-breaking decision of his, and although i don't know if he's going to back down or not i do know that i've said what i had to say and i'm in the clear.

there's nothing worse than a manager asking a developer how long something will take, interfering, and then demanding that the original deadline be met.

electron flow

from a negative ending to 2007 to a strong beginning for 2008:

december the 31st was run by a blocked nose and breathing problems that stemmed from abusing sudafed and not fully reading the instructions. who would guess that a drug used to clear the airways would have a known side-effect of causing difficulty breathing?

and why was i such a fool to forget NOT to take it before going to bed? for more than three days i've been sleeping badly in a manner reminiscent of tool - rosetta stoned (sans brown bed) because i was taking them as i went to sleep. that explains everything.

so i was a wreck when i met with the professor yesterday. in any event, my degree is beginning to look pretty worthless in terms of what's demanded in the field i want to be in, but the man i met with is great and he's interested in helping out if possible.

i slept fitfully on the train back, and passed out as soon as i got home. it was a mission and a half getting out of bed to go out, and i was disappointed that the kid was going to spend his new year's at home alone in spite of that having been my original plan too.

i taxied and walked to meet up with gco and friends, including company from two weeks ago, and we somehow ended up at hoodna for new year's... with fireworks and a marching band playing odd music and kissing aforementioned foxy niece (fn) on the changeover (and there were two of them, apparently, so we had to kiss twice)...

fn and i split from the pack and made our way to the rock party for about half an hour of great fun, then walked back (took forever) to my apartment to celebrate the new year in style. a damn fine way to usher anything in, she's nubile but tender and deceptively innocent. that was intentional abuse, i should say that she deceptively appears innocent.

we spent the day together, mostly sleeping but waking twice to watch the fifth element and vampire hunter d (shit, forgot how long that movie is) and once to get sandwiches down the road.

i'm completely bombed, and it's time to get in even more sleep before tomorrow smacks me upside the head and a new and complicated year begins.

i hope you all had as much fun as i did :)