exploitation

i've now spent the entire day (and i woke up around normal-people time) in front of the computer. that's an entire day that the guy who was supposed to give me access to a testing instance hasn't responded to my email... i've never met the guy so i don't feel comfortable harassing him...

i decided to do what i could. the first couple of hours were mostly wasted (i was barking up the wrong tree), and the rest were challenging but productive. i'm quite impressed with myself, at least. i've constructed moderated chat software that - barring any integration issues - does the job and i feel like i've gone a bit overboard in terms of edge case handling.

and it doesn't look horrible, which is a total bonus.

the only real break i took was for dinner: my uncle was on form and offensive as usual, but at least pg's developing a sense of humour about it so i don't care. unfortunately, though, he caught me after dinner for a long discussion on a topic that totally doesn't interest me.

and when i say discussion, i mean he talked at me. i've been taught that looking bored is rude, so i keep my face blank but to some people that doesn't seem to indicate much. oh, well. he did say some interesting things, at least.