Meh

The apartment is full of cardboard boxes, which boxes are full of all our stuff. As happy as the upcoming move to Chicago is, the departure from Seattle is more of a downer than I was really emotionally ready for. I have a stack of paper-journal Seattle vs. Chicago comparisons that I’d like to type at least some of in here (and may eventually), but lately have neither the energy nor the time.

The prospect of crossing the both the Continental Divide and the Great (snowdrift-prone) Plains by automobile this time of year is daunting, as well. I want to be looking forward to the move, but instead I’m all anhedonic and crabby. Later today, I think I’ll be taking the homebox offline, and crating it up for the move. Expect my online involvement (including this here resource) to be on longer-than-usual (even for me) hiatus until we’re all moved in, which could take a couple weeks in the worst case. Then again, I may manage at least one more blog entry from the officeplace before we actually hit the (scary, wintry) road on Friday.

Mars QTVR panorama

The offical NASA Mars Rover site has a couple of stitched 360° panoramic images put together from early images sent back by Spirit. These are kind of strangely formatted, and hard for non-rocket-scientists to parse as conveying a sense of place. Mr. Nick Crossland of Sheffield, South Yorkshire has rectified the situation somewhat, turning one of these images into a QTVR pano. It is so cool.

UPDATE: He’s added a panorama, based on more recent color images. Worth another visit.

Abstractions

For a long time now, this chart of the aerodrome at Keflavik International Airport has been one of my favorite maps I’ve ever seen. Seriously. I carry a full-color laser print of it around with me. I love it the way Tufte loves that Minard chart of Napoleon’s Russian campaign. (You used to be able to view the map at the Keflavik Airport site itself, but either they’ve taken it down, or the page that’s supposed to have it has a miscoded image tag. I found it in the archive wayback machine, and am hosting it myself.) I am, of course, more than a bit interested in Iceland as a possible travel destination, but the fascination here is more with the map as such. I just think it’s well drawn. I like the colors, and I think it reflects a schematic elegance as well.

More recently, I came across this image of the physical aerodrome itself. While it’s kind of neat to see a more literal depiction of something that’s been a schematic abstraction in my head for years, I have to keep in mind that the photo is its own sort of abstraction, as well. I’d hate to hazard that either is any closer to the truth of the actual location.

YES!

MCSE stands for—;

Almost every one of these made me giggle, but if I have to pick a favorite, I’m going with “Management Conned by Something Expensive”.

Weirdness

It’s weird to be here. It’s very strange to step back into an office that was my daily routine for just about three years, but that I haven’t been to in almost thirty months. I have this fear that within a couple weeks of the move back here, it will seem as though we were never in Seattle at all. Evanston has a few new high rises, but I’m surprised by those going up all the time. It really feels as though very little has changed back here.

On the other hand, I’m pretty aware that I  have changed. Just to type this weblog entry, I’m using skills (ssh, perl) that I take for granted now, but have only mastered in the last year or so. My clothes are pressed, and my head is shaved. I guess it’s like bringing a new act back to a familiar venue. Still, the sense of <voice id=”Pee-Wee”>”Whoa. Deja vu.”</voice> is overpowering.

Motion

Sorry for the lack of updates recently. Lorie and I have been travelling lately. Not only has net access been somewhat limited by this, but I’m also not sure what to say about the whole deal. The short version is we found a new apartment in Chicago. This is, of course, something I’ve been working toward for quite awhile now. Furthermore, it’s a great place in a neat location with plenty of breathing room. Among other amenities, it looks like I’ll basically be able to set up my very own music room, except that it’ll have to double as guest room for when we have out-of-town guests. I’m as keen as anything on the whole deal, but it’s awkward to blog about. Not much to say except, “Yay! Neat!” but on the other hand it didn’t seem like I could get away with just not mentioning a cross country move while I blather on about database design and ambient techno. Also, the excitement is somewhat muted by the fact that the logistical nightmare of actually moving will have to be gone through now.

Lichen(slight return)

It was recently brought to my attention that all the mp3 links over at the Lichen home page were 404ing. It appears that the scene.org mirror I was pointing people to has removed the entire /music subtree, although it continues to host demos and graphics from the archive. I have edited all the links to point to a different mirror, and everything in Lichenland appears to be happy again (lack of any recent output notwithstanding).

Snowstorm

Seattle, as you’ve probably heard by now, (or are seeing for yourself–;hello, Seabloggers!) is in the midst of a snowfall of well-nigh historic proportions. The amount of snow that’s happening right now is totally ridiculous. If there’s gonna be this much snow somewhere, it ought to at least be possible to get a decent pizza. Also, the place should have a few snowplows and salt trucks. Right now, snow abounds, but plows, salt, and pizza are utterly lacking.

On the other hand, people are sledding down Queen Anne hill, right down the middle of the street. It’s probably fortunate that it doesn’t snow more often in Seattle, but at the same time, it’s kind of too bad. Most cities are pretty magical in the snow, but Seattle quite possibly even more so.

The locals seem to be going nuts, though. This morning local news took over from the network morning news shows with wall-to-wall HOLY CRAP LOOK AT THE SNOW coverage. I myself mentioned “historic proportions” at the top of this post, but it should be kept in mind that this is a relative term: there’s not even two inches of white stuff on the ground, at this point. And it’s supposed to turn back into rain overnight tonight, which should melt it pretty quick like (high of 47°F predicted for tomorrow, as well). Back in the midwest, this’d be called gettin’ off easy.

Targeted

So, Seattle radio station 96.5 FM changed its format a couple weeks ago from being an 80’s nostalgia format to a more general “alternative” playlist (which is still pretty nostalgic, in its own way). The cute station nickname has also changed, from “the Point” to “K-ROCK”. There’s no real on-air personality (at least, not yet), just songs and a lot of these really annoyingly overblown, almost Orwellian station breaks–;”THIS IS YOUR MUSIC!! IT’S NOT JUST ROCK, IT’S K-ROCK!!!!” The whole thing smells distinctly Clear Channel-ish, and the station breaks have the same desperate quality that Chicago’s “JAMMIN’ OLDIES” station used to have. The whole thing is really fakey and contrived and reeks of careful marketing. The biggest lie are the spots that claim this is “the sound of Seattle”. Sure, there’s some Soundgarden and Nirvana in the mix, but there’s even more U2, Police, Cure, and Red Hot Chili Peppers. This is, quite simply, the sound of Everywhere.

That said, I myself am more or less right in the demographic this seems to be aimed at, and I fall for it like a total sucker. The station breaks annoy, but the songs are about the funnest thing on Seattle radio right now (apart from Expansions, of course). I even heard “Just Can’t Get Enough” by (the early, Vince-Clarke-powered) Depeche Mode on my way to work this morning. I’ve been totally had by evil genius stoopid marketroids. I love Big Brother.

crontab

I always knew cron was there, but never had the inclination or motivation to delve its mysteries, until now. Turns out, hacking a crontab isn’t rough at all. Now I shall RULE THE WORLD. Muahahaha! Or, failing that, I’ll at least set up blosxom.cgi to statically render automagically at intervals, so that comment counts on the front page here will be somewhat current (note - I really don’t wanna run this more than once/30 minutes, so it won’t be realtime current), even when I’m not otherwise updating. I’ve wanted that to happen for awhile–;it’s what made me finally learn how, actually. I’ll probably use the newfound info to do other stuff like automate backups and stuff at home, also.

Smoke gets in your eyes

From the window of our apartment, we have an excellent view of Seattle’s famous UFO-on-a-stick. This is sort of ho hum most of the time, but usually pretty keen on New Year’s Eve, when they turn the place into the world’s largest Roman candle. We can watch the fireworks right out our front window–;we don’t even have to step out the door.

This year, however, the fun was diminished somewhat, because the smoke from all the rockets going off blew more or less straight toward our front door, and rather slowly and densely at that. After the first volley, we couldn’t see the Needle at all, and could barely see any of the following fireworks. We ended up watching most of it on TV.

Spirit on Mars

Hooray! There’s a spaceship on Mars, and it didn’t crash or disappear! It’s there, and sending back pictures. I gather that the mission team members are all living on Mars time, where it’s sort of midmorning as I write this. They just played the Beatles’ “Good Morning, Good Morning” to wake up the spacecraft, and now they’ve got a lot of work to do to prepare the rover for egress from the lander.

I’ve been watching a lot of NASA TV today. Most of it is just stationary-camera shots of a room full of people gazing into monitors. It’s weird how something so dull can be so thrilling.

I was wondering, since it’s there, and can drive around and stuff, maybe it should cruise around and look for Beagle 2 and all the rest.