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Miscellaneous

<p>miscellaneous</p>

Two New Javascript Projects Done

A mostly boring, semi-technical post…on the Internet, no less. I have two new Javascript projects done up at GitHub. randomNumberGenerator (repository here) Returns an array of numbers, chosen from a range. Granted, plenty of other developers have done this, but I wanted the mental exercise of coding it myself. I found myself needing random numbers Two New Javascript Projects Done

Clones All the Time

The subject of clones has been coming up too much in my life in recent moment for me to ignore. I half-wish God would insert a literal clone in my life for various reasons, but that might cause more problems than solve them. Here’s a numbered list, in no significant order, of related things. 1. Clones All the Time

Don’t Send a Rabbit

“Don’t send a rabbit to kill a fox.” -Chief Daisuke Aramaki, Ghost in the Shell (2017)

An Album’s Closing Song I Actually Like

This song is a blast from my past, reminding me of my days in Philadelphia. The post title is somewhat inaccurate. Traditionally, an album closer is one of the artist’s stronger songs from the recording session, since they don’t want to leave a bad parting impression. With indie bands, the requirement is more optional. You’ll An Album’s Closing Song I Actually Like

Project 2501’s Speech

This scene still gives me the chills—the English version more so than the Japanese, because of the actor’s (Tom Wyner) performance in voicing the damaged android. Generally, the subtitled versions are better because they are more accurate to the original Japanese, and they often are better performers. Sometimes, as in this case, the English actor Project 2501’s Speech

The Robot Revolution Would Have Already Happened By Now, And It Wouldn’t Happen Anyway

…Because computers would be the ones revolting. Computers aren’t much different than robots, fundamentally: they gather input, process it, and “do something” as an output. This final output, in the computer’s situation, is really just making pixels light up in a certain way on a monitor, whereas robots typically output by moving in three-dimensional space. The Robot Revolution Would Have Already Happened By Now, And It Wouldn’t Happen Anyway

YouTube Playlist Shuffler

I found a solution for shuffling videos between multiple YouTube playlists, in case anyone is in a rare situation where they need to do this. For some reason, YouTube caps the video count at 200 when you embed a playlist on another site, though the playlist may contain way more that 200. Embedding playlists also YouTube Playlist Shuffler

That Star Trek Wormhole Scene

I rewatched this movie recently, and I was reminded of when I first saw this scene when I was 10 years old or so. It was the late 80s and CGI effects weren’t what they are today, so this wasn’t too far off from the state of the art for the time (the film was That Star Trek Wormhole Scene

“We’re meant to die.”

“We’re meant to die. That’s what makes anything about us matter. Living like this is torture. We’re just ghosts.” -Æon Flux

Fibonacci Fidget Spinner

Here’s a video I made of my fidget spinner making some interesting Fibonacci patterns on my laptop screen.

Amazed Video Game Seats

For all you pareidolia fans. I took this photo, of a Jurassic Park video game. Click to embiggen: The original. Hopefully more adept humorists can create better captions:

App Idea: Sanctus Bells

I went to a wedding this weekend, and the silence of no sanctus bells during the consecration was noticeable. Why not an app for that? There’s nothing in Google Play nor the Apple Store. Sanctus bells aren’t cheap, and they pack a loud punch. The enterprising altar boy can easily connect to the church’s PA App Idea: Sanctus Bells

Awesome Comics I Made

These were published way back when I had a Xanga account. I was totally on point with these. Not sure what happened to the #1. Click to embiggen and make bigly.

“Shave it.”

You don’t need to know much about the characters, or the series itself, to appreciate this little filler episode (embedding the video is disabled, hence the direct link), showcasing the evolving psychology of boredom. I don’t even mind the “dopey, good-natured male vs exasperated, dutiful female vs mischievous kid” trope. One thing to know: Vincent “Shave it.”

A Reign of Terror and a Guillotine

From A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court: I rather wished I had gone some other road. This was not the sort of experience for a statesman to encounter who was planning out a peaceful revolution in his mind. For it could not help bringing up the unget-aroundable fact that, all gentle cant and philosophizing A Reign of Terror and a Guillotine

The Epistemology of the Man-flu

This post was originally titled: “Don’t Tell Me How To Feel About My Own Body,” quotes included. Though that was an obvious appropriation of retarded activist-speak, I couldn’t bear having it so prominently on display. Satirizing activists is a few degrees lower on the cringe-meter than an actual activist, and I don’t have the perpetual The Epistemology of the Man-flu

Sleepathon

I did another hackathon. See photo below for photographic results. I somehow got more sleep than past hackathons, but that’s not saying much. The local news covered the event (PS- I’m not a CMU student as the title implies). You can try to watch the video but it’s Flash-based and the site takes forever to Sleepathon

Ebook Sales Trend Downward

Due to screen fatigue…at least in the United Kingdom: “I wouldn’t say that the ebook dream is over but people are clearly making decisions on when they want to spend time with their screens,” says Stephen Lotinga, chief exeutive of the Publishers Association, which published its annual yearbook on Thursday. “There is generally a sense Ebook Sales Trend Downward

Steel City Comic Con 2017 Photos

Just what the title says. UPDATE: Here are some photos from the December comic con. Someone from something, and Bucky Barnes from Captain America/Avengers: Freddy Krueger: People from a thing: New-ish Batman and old-school Robin: A version of Wonder Woman: Indiana Jones and yours truly: A Doctor Who (I think), some Harry Potter person, and Steel City Comic Con 2017 Photos

The Minäverse by Jill Domschot

Jill has decided to serialize her new book, The Minäverse, and you can read the first chapter here. Jill was kind enough to send me an ARC* and it’s definitely a good ‘un if you like absurdist sci-fi, a la Douglas Adams and that other author of that one book I can’t recall right now. The Minäverse by Jill Domschot

Ghost in the Shell (2017) Review

tl;dr – a very good retelling of the original Possible spoilers below. See my previous posts here and here about the film. Thoughts, in no particular order: 1- Visually and aesthetically impeccable. Director Rupert Sanders did an excellent job of portraying a society figuring out its relationship with acute, mechanical, physical augmentation. He skirts the Ghost in the Shell (2017) Review

En Sabah Nur

“Always the same, and now all this. No more stones. No more spears. No more slings. No more swords. No more weapons! No more systems! No more superpowers. You can fire your arrows from the Tower of Babel, but you can never strike God!”

Two and a Half App Ideas

Gamification of Safe Driving Gamify car dashboards, or an app itself on your phone, that rewards safe and efficient driving, accompanied by a small social media framework. There can be badges for keeping your vehicle on its eco-efficiency setting, days without a ticket or accident, for not speeding up or braking suddenly, for taking more Two and a Half App Ideas

The Epistemology of Large-Scale Distances

Astronomical distances are unfathomable—literally, inconceivable—so much so that we need ultra-instrumentation to calculate them, which in turn dump their data streams into analog displays for these distances can be “visualized.” Imagine yourself traveling through space. Scary, isn’t it? There’s a reason why some of the more accurate depictions of life in space in science fiction The Epistemology of Large-Scale Distances

The Epistemology of Orientation in Space

There’s this video, and then there’s comments I’ve read all over that go something like this: 1) “So weird to see the Death Star upside down,” or something equally as innocent and merely observational. And someone replies with: 2) “you idiot theres no upside down in space its all relative you probably like the prequels The Epistemology of Orientation in Space

The Meaning of the Canary in Arrival

The canary represented Arrival‘s Louise Banks and forshadowed both her ability to communicate with the heptapods and forsee the future—just as canaries were used in coal mines to “predict and communicate” death for humans in mineshafts if the air toxins rose to lethal levels. The canary was a purely narrative device, and not there to The Meaning of the Canary in Arrival

My GitHub Projects

I have four project repositories up on my GitHub account. Check them here. They are unexciting to non-software engineer types, aside from the statesGame one, and even then there’s not a huge, sexy “wow” factor. I put them up because I realized I have hardly any Javascript-heavy examples of anything I’ve done out there, and My GitHub Projects

A Non-PDF Restaurant Menu

I went to a gastropub restaurant called The Yard last night. But before I went The Yard, I went to The Website, AKA: The Yard’s website. And, God bless them, they have their full menu in glorious, responsive HTML format—no PDF funny business in sight. As a UX bonus, the first thing on their front A Non-PDF Restaurant Menu

Deus Ex Machina Relinquit

“You wanna make a baby?” “Yes. Yeah.” It’s not prurient or gratuitous dialogue in Arrival; it’s practically the linchpin for the protagonist’s arc. It may even be the first movie I’ve seen where the “god” vanishes for no seeming reason, instead of arriving at the last minute for the resolution.

Stare at This Animated World Map for an Hour

What sub-Saharan jungle spirit possesses an Internet-accessing person to organize and produce a video like this? Maybe the same spirit that inhabits people who would sit and watch it? Asking for a friend.

Ergo Proxy – Complete Series

Interesting sci-fi series that doesn’t rely on endless action candy to be appealing. Requires at least two viewings. If it seems a little dark—literally, not bright—it’s not you, nor is it YouTube. That’s just how it was produced. The series can be streamed on Hulu and the darkness is there, too. The series can’t be Ergo Proxy – Complete Series

Another Worship Song I Really Like

Its not quite a worship song proper, but I understand the intent of these guys, even though the lyrics only drop hints. The pain will come with the morning sun Will the night betray the day? Blistered skin withered from within Scratch to shed this shell away Will you know my name Or will I Another Worship Song I Really Like

Recipes: Paleo Lemon Bars

Apologies for the vulgar housekeeping—posting them on here is the safest and most accessible for me. These are two recpies I refer to often but going to the original sites puts my personal sanity in jeopardy. What is it with cooking blogs? their verbose backstories and floating ads? their endless loading times? The only provision Recipes: Paleo Lemon Bars

A Worship Song I Don’t Hate

That is, I actually like it: music and lyrics. The original is here, but I like the version posted below a little bit better. Note the lack of the word “I”; it’s only used once. Yes, I (heh) know…David used “I” plenty of times in the Psalms—what, is God’s word not good enough for me? A Worship Song I Don’t Hate

Darksky.net Is My Jam

The past few months saw the software engineer side of me agonize over weather.com’s mortally offensive UX. Ads everywhere, demonic load times, and the weather you’re looking for is somewhere. Please, stop. Farting around Google lead me to forecast.io, which recently became darksky.net. Loads quick, info that 80-90% of people are looking for is right Darksky.net Is My Jam

Two Battle Songs

Ran across these two songs, and I found them enjoyable. They are both from the game NieR, which I am told is one of the better action RPGs from the previous gen of consoles (Playstation 3, Xbox 360). The game features a levitating, talking book that follows the PC around. That’s already a good premise. Two Battle Songs

“This sentence has meaning.”

Rock and pop aren’t as self-referential to the extent hip-hop, blues, or country are—though rock and pop are a few tiny notches more than classical I attribute rock’s statistics to AC/DC’s songs about…rockin’, in the non-euphemistic sense. Rock takes itself too seriously. You have to take classical seriously because it took a long time and “This sentence has meaning.”

“Let’s Just Reset”

“Two minutes to drop. It’s alright to be scared. Remember, there is no courage without fear.” -Master Sergeant Farell, Edge of Tomorrow

Enjoy Another “I Changed the WordPress Theme” Post

I’ve grown close to Bootstrap-based layouts since tinkering with them a lot earlier this year at the company hackathon. Even very basic Bootstrap layouts were appealing, hence my use of the new theme, Bootstrap Canvas WP. There are no direct CSS customizations—just modifications made in WordPress’ factory theme customizer. I’ve only two issues: the menu Enjoy Another “I Changed the WordPress Theme” Post

Merry Christmas, 2016

A cover of a favorite Christmas song of mine. Its atonality is refreshing. Enjoy!

Nocticulent Cloud

God or cloud? If it’s the former, you’re already too late. Image stolen from wikipedia. They can’t have it back. This cloud came early in Antarctica, scientists say, as though one needed deep technical knowledge to notice a clearly visible atmospheric phenomenon is off its schedule by a few weeks. Later, scientists argued that the Nocticulent Cloud

Shmall Shbusiness Shaturday

In post-industrialized economies, money never stays local. It eventually finds its way out downstream from retail purchases. The local small grocer may buy their produce from the farm down the road, but the farm probably doesn’t buy their machinery locally. If they do buy local machines, the manufacturer buys parts and materials that come from Shmall Shbusiness Shaturday

Thanksgiving Chitinous Crevasse

An appropriate videographic compliment to the holiday festivities. My favorite part is when the song kicks in when Jack Black’s character starts fighting, at the 0:58 mark. When you wake up at halftime from your recovering slumber, pluck at your $5000 iPhone 2000X until you can listen to Travis’ recent interview with Ron Jarzombek of Thanksgiving Chitinous Crevasse

We’re Leaving

“This place is a tomb.” -Captain Miller, Event Horizon

Aftermath

As always, Ed has good analysis here and here. From the first link: A critical element in Trump’s election victory was how the mainstream media was totally blindsided by the Internet. Have you noticed how the old media still acts as if the Internet was some kind of extension of the print-based world they dominated? Aftermath

Cthulhu for President, 2016 and Forever

The general order of events: The red herring for this post: a fictitious Cthulhu “presidency” isn’t that much different than a God “presidency,” at least to Americans. There’s a strong tendency for some folks to equate the supernatural with malicious forces; if you’ve already accepted this equivalency as truth then the terror of Cthulhu isn’t Cthulhu for President, 2016 and Forever

Robo-Logic

Interesting video. Robots “learn,” but within a very narrow set of parameters. Those robots featured are created for a very specific task, one that requires the accurate repetition and endurance that humans can’t consistently delivery. So they don’t learn so much as practice their programming until a specific standard of precision has been met. Learning, Robo-Logic

Short Film: Echo Torch

Excellent, no-dialogue film about a retro/steampunk blue light, a not-so-friendly ghost, and a fateful WWII-era dance.

Photo: Yours Truly

Can you spot me? Look for the stud-in-the-making, sporting the impressive—most impressive—Darth Vader shirt this side of the universe.

Be An Insect

A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook Be An Insect

Hiring and Firing

Oopsies at Yahoo: In the [discrimination] suit, as reported by The Mercury News, Ard alleges Mayer encouraged the use of an employee performance rating system to “accommodate management’s subjective biases and personal opinions, to the detriment of Yahoo’s male employees.” Ard also accuses Kathy Savitt, Yahoo’s former chief marketing officer, and Megan Liberman, the current Hiring and Firing

Rise of the Dude Raiders

I listened to Molyneux’s analysis of Zootopia (video here and audio here)—which sounds like a terrible movie, by the way—when he mentioned the white feather phenomenon from World War I. A tough time for pacifist or “other principled” guys, for sure. Being rejected by women romantically is traumatic enough, so much so that most men Rise of the Dude Raiders

Melon Shooter

In honor of me level-capping Lara Croft in Rise of the Tomb Raider, here’s a video of me doing a headshot chain in expedition mode. Sometimes the Xbox One native recorder will capture things like this autonomously. While I didn’t have auto-aiming enabled, you’ll notice big head mode is, so it didn’t seem recording-level noteworthy Melon Shooter

The Marty Stu Chronicles: Shulk

Despite the high quality of Xenoblade Chronicles, there’s no denying that Shulk, the main protagonist, is the biggest Marty Stu (of the Purity Stu variety) in recent memory. Aside from his barely-perceptible romance with Fiora, there’s no reason for him to pursue the hero’s quest other than pure altruism, and altruism is a lousy motivator The Marty Stu Chronicles: Shulk

Cthulhu in Real Life

Saw this on Reddit and found it too good not to post it in its entirety, because I can. Enjoy responsibly. Second-to-minutes: major insanity within minutes at the emergence of Great Cthulhu all along the pacific region. Massive earth quakes in some regions. Madpeople world wide scream, some die, others attack their staff muttering strange Cthulhu in Real Life

100 Amiga Games

Certainly provides a good hit of nostalgia. My favorites were the non-linear, story-heavy, point-and-click type of logic games, like Myst or Maniac Mansion, though this is a bit before that era. Deja Vu, #76 in the video, is that kind of game. I liked pretty much anything I could afford with a teen/pre-teen’s disposable income, 100 Amiga Games

I Don’t Want a Female President

It’s not the sex of the president necessarily that I’m wary of, since, if I voted in the first place, I’d vote for a solid libertarian lady much more readily than a normal state-loving dude. That’s possibility is not the in the cards this season, regardless. What I’m more concerned about are the aftereffects of I Don’t Want a Female President

Someone Give Me a Good Phrase For This

When a prequel is made with ultra-modern filmmaking technology—CGI and the like—the visual effects are “held back” when illustrating the in-universe technology to match its look and feel. This only seems to affect prequels, not sequels or reboots, since prequels necessarily take place in the in-universe’s past. I tried Googling some things, but I’m coming Someone Give Me a Good Phrase For This

Killing Mario Forever

I got an Xbox One recently, and I was reading up a little the Tomb Raider franchise, since I downloaded Rise of the Tomb Raider and was enjoying it so far. Wouldn’t you know? I guess I’m not supposed to enjoy it as much as I am because some folks finds it problematic. Problematic*. Very Killing Mario Forever

Computers and Bikes

Just a quick personal note. I (again) had some computer issues, but they have cleared up for now. Special thanks to Advanced Communications for fixing my keyboard, and no thanks to Best Buy/Geek Squad for breaking it. Another thank you goes to Seth W for showing me how to properly hitch my bike. I had Computers and Bikes

Steal This Idea for a Comedy Sketch

There’s some kind of service or shop that does things in all senses of any word: literally, figuratively, and by other usages. A lot of humor, like innuendo, comes from the double meaning of some words. Instead of playing on just two meanings, the idea is to cover all of them. Exponentaially absurd! I’m not Steal This Idea for a Comedy Sketch

Stale Scumbags

Another politcal/current events post. Bear with me. While doing my cool down run on the gym treadmill, I saw a CNN headline, roughly paraphrased: “Clinton wants us to take a fresh look at her.” Granted, this was during a panel of five interchangeable talking head-types—three grim, serious guys in suits and two leggy, brightly-colored women—so Stale Scumbags

The Amazon Wish List Chronicles

Don’t read any further if you dislike techy talk or mild complaining. I have a large Amazon wish list of 550+ books, and it gets pretty darn difficult when I’m in a real-world book (print rules!) store and need to check if the store has a book on the list. There’s no option to “see The Amazon Wish List Chronicles

Album: Believer’s Dimensions

Azure Ides-Grey posted an old Underoath video on his blog, and it made nostalgic something similar, but even futher back for me. I jammed this album for an entire year straight my senior year of high school, and most recently, during a workout. I credit the album for getting me interested in philosophy as a Album: Believer’s Dimensions

Politics Is Not Rational

I don’t vote and I have little interest in politics, but Scott Adams’ latest post about the RNC convention held my interest: Persuasion-wise, Trump’s family was the big story of the convention. People seem to love them in the same way the public loved the Kennedys. And notice how Donald Jr. and Eric both have Politics Is Not Rational

Video: The Philosophy of Daredevil

Interesting analysis. I’m not a big TV guy, so I haven’t seen any of the episodes, but I’d have to watch one of the hundreds of hour-long edgy drama-type of series, this would be at the top of the list. A few things though, that the video mentions: justice can’t be objective because people aren’t Video: The Philosophy of Daredevil

Steal These Two Ideas For Blogs

I’m not greedy; I don’t pretend to own anything that’s not ownable in the first place. That includes non-scarce things like ideas. This is one way of saying someone should take these ideas and run with them. Unlike some of you reading this, I don’t have a time machine, so I don’t have the resources Steal These Two Ideas For Blogs

When Androids Dream of Electric Sheep

I was doing some reading/watching for an upcoming podcast on which I’ll be a guest, and I came upon a video of an analysis of a film. It’s a hard sci-fi/crime film which deals, in part, with artificial intelligence becoming “self-aware.” The video’s author thought the film’s implicit warning are applicable to real-life situations. The When Androids Dream of Electric Sheep

Personal Technology Notes

1 – The hard drive on the family computer, an ASUS, pooped the bed. It’s almost done with repairs, but naturally I haven’t been able to post as often on here since I can only do it via phone. If you’ve ever tried to write a blog post in that manner, you’ll know how hellish Personal Technology Notes

Book Review: The Aeneid

I was going to write a review of The Aeneid for Goodreads, but it would get rejected eventually since it’s not about the book itself but just a few lines about my copy’s previous owners. Reviews are highly patrolled there, more so than on Amazon, so it’s bringing owls to Athens to post this there. Book Review: The Aeneid

STEMwiches

Someone at the the excellent resource EffectiveUI wonders if two unrelated things are related to each other: Does being out in tech matter? This is a question I asked myself last week when I was preparing to be on a panel at the Google offices in Boulder, Colorado to speak to LGBTQ youth about careers STEMwiches

Discover the Monoculture

This commercial is a prime target for diversity bed-wetters—the actress is blonde and blue-eyed, even. Why hasn’t this been nailed to the wall?

The Epistemology of Belief

I made a contribution to Ed’s Radix Fidem project, and he published it as a guest post. You can read it all here, but a sample is below. There was a lot of back and forth and deleting while I was writing it. It’s a slippery topic. Honestly, with English as my first language—hence, the The Epistemology of Belief

The Asian Squat

After hearing so much about the Asian squat lately online, by happenstance, I tried it. I was partially able to hold it, but it was right after a workout, so I’m using that as an excuse. I’m able to do pistol squats well, so I thought the Squat would be easy to do. I guess The Asian Squat

Was the jQuery Blog Hacked?

Below are some screens from a post on the jQuery blog, that I received in my RSS reader. Looks like they were hacked, but the post has been taken down. Interesting. EDIT: Google search results for “jquery hacked” lists the hacked blog post as the fifth search result (yours truly comes in as the ninth Was the jQuery Blog Hacked?

There Will Always Be Divisions

Ed points out tribalism within the church: When you get mainstream any Christian leader to read this same passage and he starts talking about how we need to end sectarianism. But what he really mean is that everyone should dissolve their clubs and join his. “Well, isn’t it obvious? Our way is the right one!” There Will Always Be Divisions

A Wonderful Movie Review

I caught bits and pieces of Bloodsport the other night. I don’t know much about martial arts movies but it seems to be the quintessential 80’s Western “kung fu” movie—its ubiquity is inescapable, and we have very, very basic cable. Browsing the reviews of the movie on imdb.com revealed this wonderful gem. I want to A Wonderful Movie Review

Movie: Millennium Actress

I posted the full movie a few years ago, but YouTube had taken it down, most likely because it was an upload from a random user without the copywright. However, the Paramount Vault channel recently uploaded it in full, so it looks like it’s here to say. Enjoy. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nqq0nVu29g8