Written on Friday, the 29th of August, 2003 at 2:55 pm and was filed under:
Nerdity
Jeffrey Lee Parson, 18, is t33kid. t33kid is probably the lamest hacker handle I have ever seen. t33kid has been arrested for releasing a variant of the Blaster worm. t33kid lives in Hopkins. Hopkins! That's twenty minutes away! If I would have known, I would have gone and kicked his ass.
I probably would have needed help, because he is a big big guy, and I'm not talking about what may or may not be in his pants. This time.
t33kid!
http://www.computerworld.com/securitytopics/security/virus/story/0,10801,84501,00.html
t33kid!
Read 6 comments...
Written on Friday, the 29th of August, 2003 at 1:55 am and was filed under:
Food,
Speaking in Tongues
If you have ever struggled with a menu in a Chinese restaurant, take a gander at this site:
http://www.inu.org/meiwah/
It's the joint. Bonus points for you if you can send me the unicode entities for “potsticker”. Oh yes, you will be mine.
Update: thanks to http://www.tigernt.com/, I got my characters. They don't look anything like the drawings. Dammit!
锅贴 [guo1 tie1] /fried dumpling/
锅 [guo1] /pot/pan/boiler/
贴 [tie1] /to stick/to paste/to keep close to/to fit snugly/allowance/
Also, “gold” (金) is supposed to be a part of the “pot” (锅) character. I'm not sure that I see it, but maybe.
Another update- my friend beckett came up with this alternate pair of characters:
鍋贴 [guo1 tie1] /fried dumpling/
Then, because we were arguing over which character was correct, I found this on an online menu:
http://www.222.to/shanghaitown/menu.asp
鍋貼 [guo1 tie1] /fried dumpling/
The last one looks closest to what was on the site where I started, but doesn't match the online dictionaries.
As far as guo (鍋) goes, I found a kanji reference to it, which is Japanese, but the Japanese used Chinese characters as a starting point, so I think that we're on the right path.
http://www.kanjidict.com/demo/934b.html
Ah ha! I spoke with a coworker from Taiwan, and she explained that all four characters are correct, and that one set was Traditional and the other was Simplified.
Traditional: 鍋貼
Simplified: 锅贴
Here's some explanation as to the difference:
http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simplified_Chinese
http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traditional_Chinese
Of course, all of those characters are displayable via Unicode. I use html entities like 鍋 and 貼 to display the characters that I want. I could code my page in UTF-8. Then, I could just cut and paste the characters instead of translating them into numeric codes. However, my work computer doesn't have Chinese locales installed, so I don't have the fonts to show those characters. They just show up as boxes. My home computer shows everything correctly, which is way cool.
Oh yeah - Beckett wins the prize: a homecooked dinner whenever he is in Minnesota or I am in Los Angeles.
Next up: steamed or fried dumplings? Obviously, I am a fan of the fried variety, but Beckett holds the incorrect opinion that steamed dumplings are somehow better. What ever.
Read one comment...
Written on Thursday, the 28th of August, 2003 at 3:32 pm and was filed under:
Diversions
In my tiny corner of the world, everything happens on Thursdays- especially at work. Oh, sure, Friday might be just as busy- but when it comes to sheer edge-of-your seat excitement, there's nothing like Thursday to make you scream: “where is my report you fuckers! I want to finish and go home!” That report will never come, and I will be late getting home, which just rolls into the next day, and the next. And the next. It's a big smear of lateness that will someday end in horrific tragedy.
Thursday nights are “Magic Nights” at my house. “The guys” come over and play Magic, the Gathering- at least they used to play it. Now they mostly smoke a lot. It's okay, because that (and urinating into the bushes) is the purpose for which the desk was constructed. (I don't pee into the bushes)
If you haven't seen the chiminea at full tilt, you should stop by and get us to fire it up. Kory just bought a shredder, which quickly generates as
much tinder as we could hope for. It is difficult to build a fire in the chiminea sometimes - a bit like building a ship in a bottle. I have seen a
lot of lighter fluid and citronella oil expended in an attempt to get the logs going. Sometimes I have seen lighter fluid and citronella expended to
create glorious fireballs. I haven't lost any arm hair recently.
That reminds me of Matt Hotujec's fireball story. He tells it with a certain glee that probably won't translate to written text, but I will have
a go at it anyway, because it deserves to be told and retold - handed down from generation to generation, until it is not just a fireball that livens
the story, but a volcano. That would be cool! A volcano and a balrog. Never mind.
Once upon a time, when Matt was a little bit younger and less experienced in the ways of the world, he was roommates with Bryce. They moved into an
apartment with a gas oven. One day, Matt decided to cook something in the oven - probably a delicious pizza with lots of meat and cheese, but that's
beside the point. Hmm. Actually, I think that meat and cheese is always the point. Mmmmmmm, cheese…
When Matt turned on the oven, he discovered that he needed to light it. Since he didn't have a match he closed the oven door and got some matches
from another room. He returned to the oven and opened the door with an unlit match clutched in one hand.
If you know anything about gas (hehehe) you probably know what happened next, so maybe I shouldn't bother relating it. You probably want to hear
more about the meat and cheese pizza anyway, since that is what is really important. No? Okay, fine, I will finish the story.
As young Matt struck the match, the sharp tang of burning sulphur took him back to his youth in Wisconsin, frolicking amongst the cheese trees and
kissing a shy girl named Wendy - a girl he would never forget - a girl who… Well, anyway, right as Matt struck that match, Bryce walked in the
door and witnessed a tremendous ball of flame that suddenly engulfed Matt with a loud FWOOSH! Overwhelmed with concern for Matt, Bryce collapsed on
the floor in delirious laughter.
Matt, however, had heard the FWOOSH and a gentle sizzling sound as all the exposed hair on his body melted off - arm hair, beard, eyebrows -
everything. The foul reek of burnt hair filled the apartment, and a fine powder of ash floated on gentle air currents throughout the kitchen. For a
while afterwards Matt drew his eyebrows on with a sharpy. He drew angry eyebrows, which got him faster service at restaurants - but that is a tale
for another day.
I don't know if the pizza made it into the now-lit oven. I hope that it did, because it is the right of every frozen pizza to meet its full
potential of deliciousness. Mmmm…
Tonight's Magic Night has been eviscerated. Kory got a Liz Phair ticket for his birthday, so he will be at First Ave. Most of the rest of the guys
are from Wisconsin, so they will be having a masturbatory cheese 'n' bratwurst festival at Gabe's in honor of a Packers game. I will be at home
making a pizza. Delicious.
On second thought, maybe I won't use the oven.
Also, I just got my report. They had sent it to jesse.p.mullen, not jesse.p.mullan on Tuesday. Argh.
Leave a comment...
Written on Wednesday, the 27th of August, 2003 at 7:07 pm and was filed under:
Diversions
It's hard to keep a rational perspective when you're temping. notmydesk.com is there to help. Read it and weep… with laughter! It's wacky! Honestly, it's an awesome site. If there was a book, I'd buy it.
note to notmydesk.com: I can do a phat human beat-box in times of need. :P
Leave a comment...
Written on Monday, the 4th of August, 2003 at 3:59 am and was filed under:
Diversions
My mom has a very nice garden. I take a lot of pictures there.
Read one comment...
