Cognitive Dissonance

I suppose that I do more writing in the latter half of the year, mostly because of the recharge from vacation, which is where we are now. Specifically, we took an extra day out to go on vacation early. This year we are staying in the states and doing the drive to Disneyland. This is one that Yulia and I really like, and since we have done it several times. We did this trip for the first time for our honeymoon. We have gone down by train, cramped minivan, and last time with Sasha through Napa valley.

This time we have brought Oscar the Weiner Dog, and are stopping through San Francisco and Napa Valley. But that’s for the trip back. On the way down, we were planning on just stopping in Sacramento, but since we left a day early, we got a place just south of Portland for the night. It’s the La Quinta Inn, and is next to the freeway in some remote corner of Oregon where they roll the sidewalks up at night, and the only place open past 9:00 is Denny’s.

The hotel itself isn’t too bad, but is the stereotypical roadside hotel, small pool, next to a gas station. We bribed the desk lady with $20 to upgrade our room from Dungeon Quality to Tower Prison instead. But the breakfast in the morning was really nice, waffles, yogurt, coffee, the typical, but good. All part of the fun of road travel.

OK, that’s pretty hot.

A Heavy Metal Pirate Band. Sweet…

One of the things that I knew would happen when we purchased a boat was that my father-in-law would get excited. He likes to fish. Loves it, in fact. So he was thrilled to hear that we would be able to fish together. Just one catch - they live in Moscow, Russia.

And he's afraid to fly.

Well, the fish got the better of him, and they are on their way. Arriving this Saturday, in fact, and that meant I needed to finish up the spring cleaning and tuneup.

Mind you, I haven't tuned an engine since high school, and this boat is new to me, so it was a bit of an adventure. Swapping out the plugs and points wasn't too bad. Cap and rotor were easy, as was the condenser. Plug wires are simple, so all that is left is adjusting the timing.

Naturally, the batteries are dead. Fine. I fire up the charger and wait overnight. No dice. two days later still no dice, the batteries are finished. I am lucky that there is a sale right now, and I only need to replace ALL FOUR!

Getting the batteries is easy, but removing the old ones is insane. I'm pretty tall, and the engine room is pretty small. Figuring out how to get four batteries out, without spilling acid on myself, then getting four back in, and reconnecting everything took just four quick hours.

Once in place, the engines fired up nicely. I had painted the timing stud white, so it shone under the strobe lamp. The tuned engine was only a little off, and once dialed in, sounded fantastic.

Now I just have to convince my father in law not to bring his poles and hooks as carry-on items.

There is a euphoric high you get when you are so busy that you quite literally can't slow down, your brain keeps gong because you have so much to process that it just can't get done in a full day. So even when you start to rest all that happens is that you begin thinking of the separate items from the day that didn't have bandwidth earlier.

I like it.

I hand a nightmare project several years ago. Bell-Canada and MSN were going through a big deal. Total value was 250 million. and most of the critical elements for the release ran through my office. It is pretty hard to describe the level of stress you are under when you start talking about deals of this size. especially when you have an open ended responsibility.

It's not like I had some element that I could take care of, hand off, and go home. I was a Release Manager, (still am) My job was to herd the cats. I had to be there to make sure that every element happened, on time, each time. So for two weeks, I didn't go home. And didn't sleep.

Seriously.

I would leave the office at 4pm, pick my daughter up from day care, and drop her at home for Grandma (who was staying from Russia) to watch. Then I would head back to the office. I caught a few catnaps, but we never slept.

We did drink. I had beer, hard alcohol, etc. the biggest issue in a project like this is just keeping everyone sane for long enough. Code and content were being written and tested in a 24 hour cycle, non-stop. As soon as one element was done, we would get handed another. It was hell.

I had Brigada, a Russian TV series running in my office the whole time. People would wander in and catch bits going, to take their mind off the last 9 hours of testing. A few minuets and some discussion would give them enough to return and complete the work.

In the end, there were beer bottles scattered everywhere. We smelled bad. we were surly, and nasty. But we hit our date. We made the deal. And naturally, someone else got the credit. But that's just life. You have to take pride in you work whether you are getting directly rewarded or not. In this case, it was not.

I guess that everything seemed easier from that time on. So I got to take that away. But it is never worth that much time away from your family. Never. But, you don't know that until you make the mistake.

Yeah. That's life.

No matter how strange I think the Japanese are, I am wrong. They are stranger.

I love them all.

One of the things that is so great about working with the Bikini Football stuff, and TWBFL in general (especially now that they recruited me to work on the web site) is that I never have to worry about having something to do. Getting my free time swamped with work might be a bummer, but since it largely involves hanging out with hot models in tank tops and bikinis, I think I will manage.

Yesterday's project was the TWBFL Pro Shop. Looking at the site, the store that was currently setup made little sense, So I got the OK, and started setting up a Cafepress storefront to do basic shirts and stuff. I figured it would take an hour or two.

Five hours later, after chasing down all the Photoshop files, cleaning them up into hi-res PNG format, adding a "TM" to the corner, setting up all the products, sections, and that, I was done. Gah.

Just in time to head downtown to do some photography.

Yulia was leading the group in a dance thing at the Last Supper club, so they had a practice to start, and I got some photos of them doing just that. Sasha was running music for the practice, and the girls looked really good. We finished everything by around 10:00pm, and Sasha and I headed home, while the girls headed to the club to do the "Meet and Greet".

At least I'm not bored. :)

So Yulia got a part as an extra in a music video a month ago or so. It was over at the old Sand Point naval station, and was fun but a pretty weird shoot. The video just came out today:What’s funny is that not only is Yulia in the video, but Sasha and I are as well. We were hiding in an alley taking photos of the shoot (I have those here on Flickr ) and got caught on camera. With all the weird antics going on we blend right in.

I really need to take more time to write.

I have been doing some writing over at www.twbfl.com (which should open soon) and a little on Facebook, but need to take the time to blog here more. But it has been insanely busy. Work, Reviews, two gymnastics meets coming up, Sasha starting piano lessons, all kinds of stuff. It’s a bummer when you have a lot to write about, but not enough time to digest it into words.

eh. That’s life.

Well, It’s been 4 years since the death of Hunter. Between him and Douglas Adams it really sucks to not have new works coming from such great writing influences. At least Rum Diary is in production, and there are a few books from Hunter that were still in editing. Those should be out in a year or so. 

After that, silence.

Red Square, originally uploaded by Mark Hancheroff.

OK, so not wanting to ignore something interesting, I am playing around with the whole "Digital Lomography" thing. Which is just basically tweaking settings to oversaturate photos to make them look like they were taken with a funky Russian Camera called a Lomo.

Here's one of Red Square at UW.

WARREN ZEVON - YOU'RE A WHOLE DIFFERENT PERSON WHEN YOU'RE SCARED LYRICS
: "by Warren Zevon and Hunter S. Thompson

You met her in a Turkish town
But you didn't want to bring her here
You didn't want her hanging around
In the Kingdom of Fear
So you left her there

You're a whole different person
You're a whole different person
You're a whole different person
When you're scared

The eagle screams on Friday
The Colts are doomed this year
The fat's finally in the fire
In the Kingdom of Fear
Dangerous creeps are everywhere

You're a whole different person...
When you're scared

We have ways to make you talk
You won't like at all
If you can't run, walk
If you can't walk crawl
But don't look down
It's a long, long fall
And you loved her in a Turkish town
But you didn't want to bring her here
You didn't want her hanging around
In the Kingdom of Fear
So you let left her there

You're a whole different person...

You're a whole different person when you're scared"

You know I really haven't taken the time to quote Rude Pundit in a long time. Sorry. Here's to make amends...

The Rude Pundit: "So Republicans left Obama with no real choice but to get out there and, on a stage larger than Hannity or Joe the Scar has, pull down their pants and spank their little cheeks red in public. Here's the President's answer to Graham: 'What I won't do is return to the failed theories of the last eight years that got us into this fix in the first place, because those theories have been tested and they have failed. And that's part of what the election in November was all about.'

It's sad, truly, that Republicans just don't know what they're up against. No one gives a fuck what they have to say. That's the baseline from which the GOP has to start if it wants to rebuild. They have made themselves irrelevant. It's a hellish position to be in, but the demon rape couldn't happen to a nicer group of folks. Most of the country gets it: we're in serious, serious shit here. And they know that right now, the reduction of the solution to 'tax cuts' makes about as much sense as thinking you can water the desert with your piss.

And they haven't gotten their mind around what it means to deal with Obama. For the majority of Republicans in Congress, they only have memories of Bill Clinton to compare. It was easier to degrade and pigeonhole Clinton, especially since he didn't win 50% of the vote. But this shit is new. We've got a President who people want to follow, someone they admire. "

heh.