New Stuff: Geologic
Stumbling upon new stuff can be quite enjoying. After hearing an interview with George Hrab on a podcast, I knew I had to check out his podcast and music.
I finally checked it out a few days after he released a quick-and-dirty video for a fabulous song: Out of My Mind.
The music really reminds me of Thomas Dolby. Perhaps his shaven head doesn’t hurt that impression. But the thoughtfulness and the clean production quality moreso points that direction.
I’m sure I’ll come to enjoy the podcast in my regular rotation, and may have a few iTunes album purchases in my future.
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Houston Press Music Awards Showcase 2008
I saw many good friends and lots of great bands, and missed just as many good bands.
Here’s what I managed to see at the HPMA Showcase 2008: Flying Fish Sailors, The El Orbits, Umbrella Man, Katie Stuckey and the Swagger, The Tontons, Buxton, Los Skarnales, Blaggards, Bring Back the Guns, Thee Armada, Young Mammals, and Sideshow Tramps.
I only caught a song or two of a few of the bands. I really liked the Tontons; it was the first time I had heard or seen them. Thee Armada had an amazing ability to empty the room at the Venue – where the sign had been corrected: Three Armada.
I enjoyed hearing from a few guys in Pale that they enjoyed Miss Leslie a lot.
I noticed both Jay and Eric at many of the venues taking photos. And it seems Julie and Ginny were as well.
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Houston Press Music Awards 2008
Once again the Houston Press Music Awards Showcase is taking over downtown on a Sunday. For only $10 (two for $15 if you buy early), you can enjoy 6 hours of music from 6-60 bands (depending on how hard you try).
And once again the Houston Press has shown an inability to produce a grid-like schedule for the festival-type lineup.
What is wrong with those people?! Venues across the top, timeline across the left. Humans have been doing it at least as long as they’ve been plugging in guitars, likely longer.
Despite this consistent inadequacy, you should attend this weekend’s event. I’ll be there.
Those that I’m familiar with?
Houston Press Music Awards 2008 – continue reading …
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Twitter and Trees Felled in the Woods
There have been several stories in the news about companies “listening in” on the Twitter feed for people struggling with their products, and providing personal support.
A reactive Squeaky Wheel policy that can preempt possible public bad mouthing before it happens. (Or truncate it soon after it begins.)
Since those examples, I’ve made a point of mentioning the products and services i’ve had issues with. On Wednesday I got a hit.
In the morning I whined about a Web 2.0 word that annoys me:
“webinar” – i wish I knew who coined that term, so I could make them my arch enemy, and dedicate my existence to their desctruction *pow* 10 am
About an hour later I mentioned the Internet broadcast lecture I was about to start watching.
attending a webinar by MyEclipse on Maven – i.e. i’m sitting at my desk 11 am
In the afternoon, just after 2pm, I received notice that myeclipseide had begun to follow me, in apparent response to my explicit “MyEclipse” reference.
The notice was shunted to my not-so-important folder, and I didn’t see it until later that evening. In the mean time, I had complained about one issue, without mentioning MyEclipse explicitly though.
does the Eclipse java debugger have a data watch/breakpoint? or are you going to make me revert to 1970s techniques to find this bug? 3pm
There was no response from the twitter account (which would of course only confirm the limitation of the debugger).
As an explanation to the unaware who have made it this far, Eclipse is an open source IDE that is practically infinitely extensible. MyEclipse is a configured, supported version of the IDE provided for sale by a company. (IDE is an acronym for Integrated Development Environment)
Another thing of interest is that the MyEclipseIDE account is only two weeks old, with 8 of their 9 posts coming in the last 3 days. Currently they have 15 followers and 36 followees.
The Maven presentation was informative, but I suspect they don’t have the development moxie to be modifying the java debugger to support data watch points. Thus the non-response, if they even noticed it.
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Scavenger Hunt 2008, Coming Soon …
In January 2006, Allen Hill, Andrea Greer, and I battled it out for a Houston scavenger hunt and came in second.
In January 2007, we organized the scavenger hunt, and inflicted it upon twelve teams. Some of the outcome is memorialized (a few items Questionably SFW). Go to the “Entries” section and click on any particular team to see most of their photographic entries.
There is also an excel file with the list of items that the teams were tasked with photographing. (There were also photos of 10 items they could duplicate – if they knew what they were and where they were.)
January 2008 came and went. No scavenger hunt.
I’ve bumped into a few people off and on … “when’s the scavenger hunt?” Well, now I have an answer for you: November 8.
So, you can put in on your calender, and shudder in anticipation. You can study up on your Houston architecture and history. You can line-up your team.
A note to the novice: make sure your team mates have the same goal as you. Do you want to spend a leisurely afternoon with friends? Do you want to experience a different side of Houston? Do you want a randomly directed good time? Or, do you want to crush the other teams like the bugs they are?!
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The Math Entertainer No. 1: Quickies
I obtained a book a few years back from Crazy Mike’s Crazy Emporium, that was once located at what is now Sig’s Lagoon.
This 1959 book was written by Philip Heafford, Department of Education, University of Oxford: The Math Entertainer. His goal, from his introduction seems extremely optimistic. To entertain enjoyers of mathematics, but also to interest those who think they don’t like math.
(As a side note, this book was a gift to someone from Aunt Thelma and Uncle Nolen in 1974.)
The book contains 50 quizzes. And here, throwing copyright to the wind (that discussion for another day – and if the author would like me to remove this post, he need only ask), is the first quiz.
How many can you get? (feel free to post a reply) I got maybe half of them, maybe less.
Quiz No. 1: Quickies
Do these numbers ring a bell? For instance, the number 365 would mean only one thing to me, and that is the number of days a year. Ask someone to test you with this quiz. Six seconds for each question. How many can you get right in the time limit of two minutes for all the questions?
- 1,760
- 2,000
- 4,840
- 640
- 1.732
- 2.54
- 3.1416 . . .
- 366
- .3010
- 1492
- .4771
- .4971
- 1.6
- 1.414
- 1,728
- 3-4-5
- 6,080
- 62½
- 90
- 88
The answers, who got them, and my thoughts will follow (at some point).
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