Reason #53 why it’s embarrassing to be a geek.

Their egotism makes them think their problems are special. Confidential to Strom Carlson: It’s the whole damned English-speaking world. Have you not read Eats, Shoots & Leaves?

Money for nothing and your bugs for free.

This story is a very interesting read on the money trail between Microsoft, the softening of the antitrust judgments against the company, and the growth of the anti-Linux lobbying push. As if it weren’t enough that their software is the proximate cause of the majority of aggregate IT downtime globally. I’ve often wondered to what extent resources wasted on virus scanning, spam relaying, security breaches, and other Windows nonsense has a measurable impact on GNP. Does anyone have a bead on sources for such information?

Definitely smells like a duck.

So, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the Iranian president-elect is a terrorist? (The adjective “former” just doesn’t seem to hang well with that particular noun.) How long do we expect it to take for Congressional Democratic Party mouthpieces to denounce this as yet another in a long line of incendiary tactics of the vast right-wing conspiracy, designed to bolster support for marginalizing and oppressing poor, defenseless Middle Eastern nations?

Elections in Iran are a sham in any case. Ahmadinejad was “elected” from a small slate of nominees winnowed by the religious Council of Guardians, who are themselves appointed by the “Supreme Leader,” a sort of über-cleric who holds the real governing power in Iran. All of which political fakery is designed to insure the continuity of ultraconservative, theocratic Islamic rule, to suppress democratic reform, and to quell the human urge for liberty.

We should not be surprised such a person has been elevated to a position of power, especially given Iran’s continual commitment to thwarting peace. Ahmadinejad is merely a human codification of radical fundamentalist Islam’s true animus toward freedom and peace. The left will undoubtedly wring its hands and burn the midnight candle over language designed to show how they are tough on terrorists, while simultaneously avoiding giving any credit to the current Administration for their honest assessment of this morally and spiritually bankrupt movement.

One man’s trash is another man’s trepidation.

Eleya holds our very first Garden Bazaar today. The sale of our Sundries and Trinkets, amassed over half our lifetime, will hopefully render enough Coinage to allow us to flee the drudgery of this awful domain and start a new life in America. Thus far she have collected a Grand Total of $0.75, so I must yet refrain from booking Passage to the New World, though the steam whistles of the mighty Leviathans at the nearby Docks and the cry of the Gulls tug at my Heart like a Vagabond at the strings of an empty Money-Purse. I bought her Water to cool her as she displays Jewellery and Fine Fabrics for the throngs of wealthy Industrialists and shopkeeepers who pass in their fine Carriages.

I have heard tell that America presents in its westward facing Aspect a vast, wild Frontier, populated by red-skinned Savages and gigantic Herds of wild Horses, Cattle, and Buffalo, is practically free for the taking, and he who would tame that Land and work it himself could make such a Life! For now, it is naught but a Dream, and cursing silently, and only to myself, I must return to my grimy, sweaty Existence, a Hephaestus of the Modern Age, subject to the Vile Exploitation of Messrs. MacGillicuddy, Keegan & Leicester, Proprietors, toiling incessantly away at the Black Seam. O Fortune! what I would not give for but your Brief Smile.

Snippets fresh from the scissors.

The food chain that eats its own tail.

To Chris’ post on bacteria-devouring virii, I say why not? After all, we already have oil-eating bacteria. What puzzles me is, why can’t we just eliminate the middleman and pass the savings on to you?

Revisionism on revisions.

I hate CVS. I used Subversion for my own repositories (until I killed them with the computer equivalent of a well-aimed Peterbilt truck to the cranium). I have to use CVS for my work with the Fedora Documentation Project, and let me tell you, there’s nothing quite like the distress caused by generating a 2,000-line commit email because you moved a filename in CVS. (Okay, so there was that little thing about mistakenly tagging the .PNG files too, but at least I didn’t regress the release numbers. Did I mention I hate CVS?)

Girlie-men need not apply.

I’m feeling pretty proud of myself, having fixed our powder room toilet, which over the past few months haw gradually suffered a decline in its ability to refill after flushing. I had previously replaced the stopcock assembly and checked the whole thing for leaks, but with no effect. Turns out the cheap rubber washer in the inflow valve had come loose and blocked the pipe, growing steadily worse as deposits built up. One hard plastic washer of identical size later, the toilet works like it did when it was new. Bow before my mad plumbing skillz, minions!

The lure of forbidden fruit.

I am a stickler for keeping my fingers off CDs and DVDs. The idea of coating the plastic surface of all that digital media goodness with my yucky finger oils and dead skin cells just turns my stomach. I’m always neurotically careful to hold them by the edges; it’s a bit of an obsession, frankly. I can’t tell you how many times I receive DVDs from Netflix or CDs back from friends at work or home and they are munged up with all sorts of skin goo. I have to restrain myself from taking the offenders by the shoulders, shaking them violently, and screaming, “Do you have any idea what you’ve done? You have compromised the integrity of my digital media! DIE FROM SEPSIS AT THE WRONG END OF A RUSTY SCALPEL, INFIDEL!“

So, yes, that is a little unhealthy, I agree.

In any case, today I had burned a “bad” CD — commonly referred to as a “coaster” — and I was carrying it to the media trash pile where we leave CDs and other media to be disintegrated by Martian death rays, or whatever the office is buying these days. I realized I was holding it as if it was utterly critical that the media remain unsullied, all the way to the death ray machine, whence its various molecules would be spread across the known universe in a thin, buttery spread that goes great with marmalade. So I took this opportunity to touch the back side of the CD, where all the data gets written (that information is for the two of my readers who aren’t geeks).

Sadly (and a little disturbingly, to tell the truth), I felt a little thrill of the verboten, almost like Salma Hayek left the door cracked open at Victoria’s Secret, and I just happened by while buying a gift certificate for my wife. Because of course, that’s the only reason you’d catch me in that store. Not the Salma Hayek part, I mean buying the gift certificate. But if Salma was there, I’d certainly be more inclined to buy a gift certificate.

Not one to stop there with one vicarious trespass, I proceeded to smack my grubby fingers all over the back of that CD. My fingerprints will be used to trace my whereabouts when the Besmirchment Police haul me off to a basement interrogation room and give me two to the back of the head. Oh, the forbidden pleasure of seeing all that grimy data corruption!

You better watch out, in case I come to your neighborhood and start taunting very small dogs. That’s right, ladies, I’m the one yo mama warned you about, aw yeah.

The war is over.

My hell week at work ended on Thursday night, but I spent pretty much the whole day Friday with a couple of my friends who were attending. We went sightseeing down the Civil War Trails, visiting the battlefields of Chancellorsville, Wilderness, and Spotsylvania Courthouse, with a side trip to downtown Orange and Charlottesville. The exhibits were fascinating, especially the film we saw at the Chancellorsville exhibit. There is a Fredericksburg center as well, which I will try to visit at some point in the next few weeks when time allows. I think I have a yen to start doing some reading on the Civil War to try and make sense of the military movement and strategies involved, with which I’ve always been fascinated but, frankly, perplexed.

I had the idea (probably not a very original one) that the life of Thomas J. “Stonewall” Jackson would make a phenomenal biopic screenplay. I even thought through a little of the structure and some of the broad strokes of the themes and character arc. I may get a couple biographies and devote a little time to this pet project over the summer. I would be surprised if such a screenplay would attract much attention. Thanks to the success of the PC movement in Hollywood, Jackson is demonized since he came from the evil slaveholding South. This, despite the fact that he arose from a life of poverty and tragedy to graduate from West Point and become a brilliant military leader, a devoted husband and father, and one of the most important and recognized figures in American history.

While I certainly abhor the idea of slavery, and I’m glad the Union won in the end, people are a product of their time. To judge Jackson against the standards of 21st century America, 50 years after the civil rights movement, is the height of ludicrousness. I think it would be a great and worthy challenge as a writer to try and make him a heroic and sympathetic character without regard to his cause, while not whitewashing the fact that he shared it.

The 4 for the rest of us.

Fedora Core 4 is released today! Join the torrent if you have some spare bandwidth, and remember to leave it open to help others.

Music masters.

I’m glad Chris agrees with me about not only George Lucas, but Ben Folds and my all-time favorites Del Amitri. The Dels bottomed out sales-wise with their adventurous and occasionally brilliant electronica-laced Can You Do Me Good?, and then unceremoniously broke up with a mid-2002 announcement from lead singer Justin Currie. In the intervening time, Currie formed The Uncle Devil Show with the McDermott brothers and released the album A Terrible Beauty, and recently has been sharing front duties for the Scottish folk nouveau ensemble With Strings Attached, no album out yet. According to the wilting official web site for the Dels, Currie is now finishing a solo album, and working with Dels co-founder and brilliant guitarist Iain Harvie on a new record of electronica pop.