September 30, 2004

Wake Up. Here's what the situation in Iraq is really like. Democracy, indeed. What a disaster.

Hrmm. So the debate is tonight, which interests me a little bit—I'd like to watch Kerry destroy that other guy, but since it's going to be so tightly scripted, I don't think it's worth watching. Instead, I'll shut off the TV and ignore it.

Here's a sketch of what the house could look like without the enclosed porch. Since I did this, Jen and I agreed on different pillars (square, perhaps tapered in sort of a Craftsman vibe) and larger windows on the sunporch (over on the side, first floor.)

Album of The Day: Death Cab for Cutie: Transatlanticism. Thanks to Shelly, I am totally hooked on this album. Nate tried to get me into DCFC about three years ago, and I was not into it. I think the Postal Service opened the door, and now I'm going to grab the back catalog. | link

September 29, 2004

Space. Been spending the morning watching the live feed from SpaceShipOne as they attempt to win the Ansari X-Prize. Absolutely thrilling stuff. We thought he was going to wrap it, but from what they said, the wild rolling at the very end was expected. | link

September 28, 2004

It's Too Late, Baby. It probably wasn't a good idea to leave most of the windows open this morning.

Top ten CSS tricks you may not know. (via dominey)

My New Shirt-Folding Technique Is Unstoppable. Look upon me and weep in amazement. I have tried this, and it works. Rejoice! (via metafilter)

The second of three floor-sanding quotes came in yesterday, and it's about $300 less than the first. This guy was really cool as well. Meanwhile, a cherry '78 Scout showed up on the DC Craigslist for $3,700 in running condition—the same amount for a new fiberglas tub delivered to the house. I cried myself to sleep last night. | link

September 27, 2004

Fonts. A few years ago I came into possession of a designer's Holy Grail: a CD burned with meticulously organized font collections, obviously compiled by some lowly summer intern and then passed, hand to hand, like a Grateful Dead bootleg. Not long after I got the CD, I bought a second-hand laser printer and burned out two ink cartridges making spec books. The four (!?!) binders were carted to each job I took, placed high on the Shrine Of Anal Retentive Designer Worship, and consulted in times of crisis.

Since I made those books, we've bought, traded and collected a bunch more fonts from various sources, and I've lost track of what we actually have. So last week I began to take advantage of the double-sided print function here at work and print out the catalogs we don't have spec sheets for. I'm through the second catalog and I have a stack about an inch thick, four-up on a sheet. And there's five catalogs to go.

View From The Top. My Dad took a plane ride this weekend and sent us the digital pics from his trip: here's my grandparents' farm looking south from across the road.

My Kidneys Hurt. Renie got a late start on the road Friday, so Jen and I drove into the city for some dinner before she got in. It's always a good thing when your server recognizes you with a smile, and even better when they offer you a free round to welcome you back. Saturday morning we drove down into Ellicott City for some breakfast and to drop in on Home Anthology, where we found a shelf full of old signage lettering and lots of beautiful furniture we can't afford right now. Continuing on to the IKEA, we wandered through the aisles and made it almost to the checkout with only a bag of tea candles before a new wine rack jumped into our cart. Back at home, we helped Jen put dinner together, a mouthwatering pork tenderloin with saffron rice, and we stayed up late talking, polishing off three bottles of wine.

Sunday we nursed hangovers and headed into the city to help our friend Shelly move out of her apartment; between the five of us and Doug's box van, we got everything into the house in an hour and a half. They then treated us to some of the best sushi we've had in years, at a little restaurant at the foot of the hill in Mt. Washington. (From what we understand, the sake martini wasn't too shabby, either.) The rest of the evening was more relaxed, mixing a bit of freelance, lots of couch time, and an evening walk to the local ice cream stand.

Renie's at the house right now working on the resume and keeping Penn company; she's promised us dinner tonight, so Jen and I have to decide where to go. Ideas, anyone?

(Special shout-outs to Shelly for the fantastic music I didn't even know I wanted.) | link

September 24, 2004

In No Particular Order. Up until 1:30 freelancing last night, and back at work at 8:30am. I feel swell.

September 23, 2004

Priorities. The roof estimate comes in at about $1,500, which is somewhere around what I figured. While not great news, it's better than being told the whole thing is shot. So the floors will wait a little while longer.

Overheard at Dinner. The setting: a whitehaired dude sitting four booths down from us at the restaurant down the street suddenly exclaims to his table:

"The difference is, George Bush never threw his medals away!"

It took all my strength to resist yelling back, "At least Kerry earned some medals."

Activism. Last night there was a meeting at the elementary school across the street about a proposed road-widening not too far from our house. We're near a major north-south artery off the beltway, and the State Highway Administration wants to three-lane one of the feeder roads, citing accidents and public safety as their major reasons. Living on a highly trafficked state road already, the idea of opening the area up to further congestion does not appeal to me. I'm one of the weird folks who believes that wider roads don't ease congestion, but promote higher speeds and enable more traffic to back up. I believe in alternative methods for "safety".

We've been in the house for a year now, and we've only met a handful of our neighbors. I don't think we've offended anybody on purpose; we don't let our dogs crap on their lawns, shoot bottle rockets at their windows, or mow the lawn naked. The "community association" in our neighborhood seems to be run by people who aren't predisposed to welcome new arrivals—they held their annual picnic two weeks ago and never bothered to invite us, or our friends who live across the street. (Just wait 'till I put my "Kerry For President" sign on the front lawn.) So it was interesting to see all of these people together in one room.

The meeting was as you'd expect: one tired-looking state official fielding questions from a room full of frightened residents, with the occasional whitehaired man shouting rambling statements at him. Jen and I filled out our opinion cards and listened to the rabble for a while before leaving; I decided to sign up for the community organization south of us so I have some connection to the opposition (I'd say the room was 95% against, with four or five people timidly raising supporting hands in an informal poll) and the neighborhood. This should be an interesting foray into local politics. | link

September 22, 2004

Hello! We're in the middle of making plans to have my sister Renie join us this weekend for a much-needed break away from her job, and I think we're all getting excited. There are some tentative plans for IKEA, possibly some Home Anthology, and a lot of refreshment.
Update: Looks like Renie's going to need more than a few drinks- her asshole company just laid her off. We're going to see if she wants to come south a little sooner than Friday. That makes a combined four five layoffs for the Dugan family in the last five years. "Recovering economy" my ass.

Lucky Break. It turns out that our atrium windows are ½" away from being standard size—I was able to find an off-the-shelf storm window at the Lowe's for $33 to button up the side of the house. That's much better than $130/ea. I was quoted for custom-built versions, and I can work around the missing half-inch. | link

September 21, 2004

?!? This article made me stop and think about our upcoming trip to California. In my company, the guy who approved the installation of this "system" would have his ass handed to him on a platter. The idea that the whole ATC system crashed because some guy had to remember to reboot it is ridiculous. Um, couldn't the programmer have added that little detail in, if it was so frickin' important? (Notice I'm not bashing Microsoft, which would be too easy—still, it's funny to read these articles and have huge ads for Windows appear on the same page.) (via slashdot)

Oh, Hello. This morning my cellphone went off as we were getting ready for work at about 8:45. I've been calling all over creation getting quotes on different stuff for the last couple of days—not because we have the money, but because somehow knowing how much things will probably cost is one step better than not knowing how much anything will cost and having the great unknown hanging over our heads like a black cloud of doom.

Anyway, I've been playing phone tag with roofing contractors for a few months now. Getting a roofing contractor to come out for a quote is hard enough; on the food chain of home improvement contractors, roofers are below sewer plumbers and above housepainters and therefore not the most reliable of fellows. (Being a working plumber implies that you went to trade school and probably apprenticed under somebody. Getting a job as a housepainter is easier than robbing a 7-11, less dangerous, and provides as steady a supply of weed as a short-order cook, but without the available pool of single waitresses.) Slate roofers are smarter than the average roofer, in that their trade is skilled (I've laid asphalt shingle, and it ain't rocket science) but more in demand, because there aren't a lot of guys who are good enough to do it and also smart enough to convince people to pay what it costs to do the job right, so they're harder to find. When the phone rang this morning and he told me he was outside, I threw on my jeans and ran out in socks to talk with the guy. He was really personable, got up on the roof and put in some temporary patches over the slow leak on the southwest corner, and gave me the straight dope: about 60 slates are in need of repair. At about $5-7 per slate, that's not a bad per-material cost, but the day it'll take to fix everything will be the major hit. I fear that the flooring may have to wait until we take care of the roof, but I know I'd sleep better this winter with a solid cap on the house. | link

September 20, 2004

Recap. Friday night I installed a dehumidifier ($139 from Sears) in our steaming, fetid basement with a hose going directly to the drain. I also put stringers in the linen closet and blocked out where the pass-through medicine cabinet will be, while adding at least four inches of dust to the upstairs bedrooms. Saturday I finished up the major part of my consulting gig, then returned home to continue on the closet. Jen was out of town, so I stopped over at the neighbors' for some pizza and beer, which was a lot of fun. Sunday the skies were blue again, so I continued the housework, stopping only for a visit with Dave, who dropped off a loaner bass cabinet for me to play with. Thanks Dave! | link

September 17, 2004

Crap. Boy howdy, do I feel like crap today. Too much red wine last night.

Person 1 leaves memory card in car. Person 2 finds it and starts a fictional blog based on the pictures. Hilarity ensues.

Quote one for the downstairs floors is somewhere between $1,800 to $2,400, including the kitchen floor. Higher than I was thinking, but still reasonable. I guess to have it completely done in three or four days would be worth the extra money. We'll keep you posted on quote number two. | link

September 16, 2004

Free (sort of.) My MasterCard is 100% paid off. (Breathes sigh of relief.) Now to pay off the San Francisco trip on Jen's card...

I seem to have a burgeoning business doing some IT consulting—really, I'm just filling in for a friend—but it's interesting to see how many people are in need of good Mac help. Last night I resurrected a dying drive from an iMac and got it ready to burn to DVD, which will make the clients very happy. They bought an Airport Express for use as a wireless base station—I wasn't aware you could use it as a stand-alone base station; I thought it was just a remote extender for an existing wireless network. Stupid Bill! | link

September 15, 2004

Priorities.

Jen: They had better say they like this, those bastards.
Me: Perhaps you shouldn't refer to your clients as "bastards", baby.
Jen: ...Well, they're not clients, they're friends, so I can call them bastards.

Wow. After something like five years of refusing to do any kind of print work in Quark, it's frightening how many of the key commands I still remember.

I put up a very basic page early this morning attempting to outline some of the projects I have in mind for this endless money pit house of ours; it's extremely incomplete and basic, but is a step above the seventeen dogeared, smeared slips of notepaper I have floating around my messenger bag, which don't make any sense a week after I've measured, sketched, and noted on them.

Am I really this boring, or did you guys forget how to comment? | link

September 14, 2004

More Changes. I'm mucking about further with the HTML behind this page; it's slowly crawling towards 100% XHTML compliance (don't even bother trying to validate this page- it'll explode.) bits and pieces here and there are getting rewritten, then rewritten again—the calendar over there on the left is a good example, and it's still not done. Originally I had intended to build around a new redesign, but I'm going to stick with the layout I have for the time being and get it to where I want it to be.

Cash. My mother gave me a subscription to Vanity Fair a few Christmases ago, because she'd see me bogarting her copies when Jen and I were heading down on to the dock to swim. Truthfully, I was looking for reading material besides Better Homes, which I'd never read, and The New Yorker, which I already get, because I never bring reading material when I visit. I find the magazine a strange hybrid of fawning starlust and lurid true-crime stories of the Rich and Famous (seriously, how many people have been murdered suspiciously in the Hamptons? And do I really care? I'll never vacation there, and sure wouldn't consider it now, given the apparent homicide rate.) Still, between the profiles of über-rich asshole society figures and glossy Bruce Weber photos of young rich Hollywood stars, there's the occasional nugget of goodness. This month, there's a profile of the strange, fruitful collaboration between Johnny Cash and Rick Rubin, which is worth the price of the magazine—I was a latecomer to the music of the Man in Black, but have grown to enjoy his early work, which makes the last five albums of his career stand out in greater relief, and highlight the genius of the work they did together. I'd link you to the article, but Condé Nast has a dumbheaded anti-Web policy where they don't post anything online that I can find.

Wax On, Wax Off. Today we have a fellow meeting us at the house; he's going to give us an estimate for sanding and finishing the first floor and stairwell. We decided, because it's mainly oak with a decorative inlay, that having a pro do the first floor was the best course of action—that, and the fact that it'll be done in a weekend as opposed to a month. Hopefully the quote will be low, the timeframe will be soon, and the job will get done quickly.

Huh. International has gotten back into the business of building pickup trucks... sort of. | link

September 13, 2004

Have You Seen My Monkey? I made a monkey for Jen yesterday—more specifically, I made a monkey for Jen's friend Jean-Paul and his wife Sharon, who are having a baby very, very soon. This is but one of the ideas she's working on for an announcement, and I liked it so much I thought I might share it with you here. Because monkeys are cool, and monkeys with bows in their hair are that much cooler.

The weekend's activities were productive, in direct opposition to last weekend. Saturday I did some onsite consulting for a friend of a friend, rebuilding an eMac and getting it ready for a migration. Sunday I got the rest of the front windows scraped and primed, then worked my way around the side to the doctor's office and atrium windows. Sunday evening I put a bunch of hours in on the other consulting gig I'm working on, while watching the Star Wars special (AKA a 2-hour infomercial: Buy the DVD!) that was on cable last night. | link

September 11, 2004

praying mantis on the porch light, 9.11.04

This brutha was about as long as my hand. Photogenic, too. He just sat there and watched me take his picture, not scared of anything. What a badass. | link

September 10, 2004

Ticket, Please. Plans have been made for a trip to San Francisco to see my two best friends from college tie the knot. Oh, lordy, this is gonna be crazy. (the link works now.)

Album Of the Day. The Killers, Hot Fuss. This album gets better the more I hear it.

The sun is bright and warm outside, and the sky is a deep blue. The last vestiges of Hurricane Whatever blew off last night, bringing cool, dry air with it. I intend to make the most of the weekend by slapping a coat of paint on whatever is in front of me. Look out, cats. | link

September 9, 2004

No More Tears. Today I hijacked Nate and drove down to Timonium to look at a 19" LCD monitor being sold off Craigslist. I should back up and describe our current office setup: We have a four-year-old G4 Mac tower and a 9-year-old Apple 17" display as our main design system at the house. The monitor is so old that fuses blow when I power it up. It's bigger than the Jeep and its highest resolution is 1024x768—big stuff for 1995 but unacceptable for today's work. Plus, the refresh rate is about 4mhz, so it sends Jen into fits of seizure when she has to look at it for more than five minutes. I know I've been bellyaching for months about money, but this seemed like a no-brainer for $450. I have it plugged in to the Powerbook, and it's absolutely beautiful.

Everybody welcome Stellan Heazlett online when you get a chance.

Eulogy. I drove out north yesterday to pick up Jen at Henry's funeral yesterday, and was able to pay my graveside respects. He was, we agreed, a 'peculiar' fellow (I won't go into the hotpants thing right now) but someone with a huge heart. During his eulogy, the rabbi mentioned that when Henry knew you had a problem, he offered his help without fail, and I'd have to agree with that. While talking about it last night, Jen and I realized that it's been over a year since we saw him last: moving Jen out of her apartment, we had no way to get two old easy chairs and a couch to the dump. Henry drove up in his pickup and within five minutes had helped us wrestle two of the chairs on his truck, and by the next day had made all three disappear. Shalom, and thanks for the vanishing of the furniture, Hotpants Henry.

Clearing Out the Link Cache. Canon PowerShot strobe information. E-TTL info, or: does my frickin' flash work? | Digital camera primer. SLR vs. point and shoot. | Replacement APC battery. My APC is dead as a doornail. | IHC lineset ticket codes. Deciphering my Scout's lineset ticket, made easy. | Single-axle and enclosed trailers. Unfortunately, they are very expensive. | Card sorting for application/site design. Handy, but impractical for my 9-5 gig. | Upgrading an eMac. I have a freelance tech job this weekend. | Cheap iPod replacement battery. Jen's iPod is still busted. | Finally, an interesting book on productivity, as well as a productivity application. I need all the help I can get. | link

September 8, 2004

After an abortive final attempt to set up my own WebDAV server at the house for publishing calendars from iCal, I broke down and gave up. Instead, I'm using iCal Exchange, a free WebDAV service set up to help normal folks like me. Sweet.

"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety."
—Benjamin Franklin

Do we really need to hear any more bullshit? Kerry's people had better wake up and start hitting back, or this election is already over. (fake Onion humor via metafilter) And I'm embarrassed to say that this dude is from Maryland. I hope Obama stomps him. | link

September 7, 2004

Recap, Part 2. We rented Mystic River and Kill Bill Volume 2 this weekend, and while both were good, about 20 minutes of a third movie on cable almost stole the show. (More on that in a minute.) Mystic River was a well-acted, well-directed movie that I don't believe I'd watch again. I was expecting, well... more. It was the movie equivalent of a Chalupa: it filled me up but I felt empty afterwards. KB2 was just long. Too much talking, not enough ass-whuppin'. Sure, the situations were interesting, but it could have been handled as one long movie minus a pile of the filler in between. Watching a showing of Reservoir Dogs on cable Sunday night put into contrast how overblown Tarantino got with KB2. Jackie Brown was an excellent, funny, adult movie, well written and directed, which got overlooked because it wasn't Pulp Fiction 2. The momentum in KB2 sort of tuckered out weakly into lots of half-interesting dialogue, none of which had the snap and crackle of Jackie Brown or Pulp Fiction. I guess I'd recommend renting both in the series and watching them back to back, if at all.

The movie that stole the show was the Royal Tennenbaums, which we caught about 15min. of on Monday. All the best off-kilter ideas in another movie by the folks that brought you Rushmore, a personal top-10 favorite. We're going to have to catch this on DVD at some point real soon. | link

September 6, 2004

Recap. The labor day weekend is usually supposed to be a celebration of beer and barbecue in the backyard, then getting stuck in traffic on the way home. Because the Lockardugan house is a poor house, we were content to lock the doors, grill some burgers, drink cheap beer and hide out to recharge our batteries. We had grand plans to "get lots of stuff done", which is a blanket statement that means "planning an impossibly long checklist of stuff we'd never accomplish with four friends in two weeks." I had hoped to make serious headway on the outside windows by finishing off the front of the house and working my way over to the side. Jen had hoped to get out into the garden and battle the weeds that have taken over in her absence. Three days seemed like a blank check to have all of this done and more. What actually happened was a lot of sleeping, some lazy consumption of food until noon, halfhearted attempts to motivate into a productive phase, an early cutoff for dinner, and then more sleeping. We did get the second-floor front windows finished, and the side garden dug out. Unfortunately Jen's ankle met with an unscheduled twist in the backyard, and we postponed our afternoon for a visit to the St. Agnes emergency room, where the diagnosis was a bad sprain. Mother and ankle are resting comfortably on the couch with warm soup and grapefruit juice.

Did anybody else realize that this dude on CSI: Miami was Slater from Dazed and Confused? | link

September 3, 2004

Yeah. I have to agree, the current Liz Phair album sucks. (One of my top twenty favorite albums is Exile In Guyville. Pick it up if you don't have it already.)

I Heard It On The Radio. Let's just be clear here, before I get started. I love my Jeep. It's running like a top, it has cold A/C, all the buttons and dials and switches work, and it seems to like me. However, the radio has developed a nasty habit of not working reliably anymore. On hot days, when it's been sitting for a few hours in the sun, I'll get about two minutes of NPR before the reception dives into the toilet. Then all I can seem to get in are the the annoying right-wing talk show stations, which I have no interest in hearing anyway. Even better, whenever I pass a radio relay tower, high tension power line, or cell relay tower, the reception across the dial goes down like a drunken prizefighter, and doesn't come back up at all. So I'm looking to replace my right-wing radio with something inexpensive but flexible. My requirements are simple: $150 or less, an auxilliary input for the iPod, removeable face, and a CD player. I don't need a remote, 400 billion watts of power, a changer, or a DVD display. Crutchfield is the obvious choice for this purchase, and I found an inexpensive Blaupunkt with all the things I need or $130. | link

September 2, 2004

An Auspicious Start. I woke up this morning with Teller the cat anxiously pawing my face for food and a splitting headache. I dozed through Jen's shower and rose a half-hour late to make coffee, only to find she'd already done it. Two ibuprofen later, I was in a better state and paused to look at the week's progress: one coat of primer in the linen closet, a working light, and the pipe access door mudded for sanding. The front windows are on their second coat of paint and looking for a final touch-up before I put the storm windows back and move on. Not bad for a week's work.

Alien Pod. Since I brought my busted Airport Base Station back into work, I've had three different people enter the ubercle and say, "Whoa! What is that?!?" After I explain it to them, they nod approvingly and we continue our work-related issues. Single men, take note: walk your Base Station at the park this week; the chicks will stop and ask what it is, at which time you can strike up conversation and get a phone number. It's as good as a puppy or a baby. Anyway, I decided not to order the repair kit from this "company", as their "home page" is all broke-down and I get a suspicious vibe. I'm just going to hit Baynesville Electronics and pick up the capacitors I need on my own to repair it. | link

September 1, 2004

Victim Of My Own Success. the iMac I have set up here at work as an iTunes server has been discovered by the rest of the office. Because of the five-stream limit Apple wrote in to the sharing feature of iTunes, I'm not able to listen to my own music right now.

Brief Political Statement. I'm glad I'm not in New York City. Now, why is the news media ignoring the comments of Dennis Hastert, your House Speaker, the third most powerful Republican in the country, who accused George Soros of financing his empire with drug money last Sunday? (Soros is anti-Bush, and, understandably, kinda pissed.)

Vote Democrat. Vote Independent. Vote Martian. Just get these pricks out of office, please.

Thank You. To the good people of Home Depot: You'll let me test nailguns in the Tool Corral unsupervised. You'll let me carry flimsy cans of highly toxic substances through your store and help me load them into my trunk. You'll leave dangerous circular saws unattended and plugged in throughout the store. You'll trust an 18-year-old kid to drive a forklift loaded with half a ton of drywall over my head and store it on a rack thirty feet in the air. You'll rent me a wood chipper to grind the brush in my backyard or dispose of Steve Buscemi, whichever I choose.

Why is it, then, that you won't let grown adults cut glass to order in your stores because of "insurance reasons?" I wasted half the evening driving across western Maryland looking for somebody who could cut me two panes of replacement glass. (For the record, Lowe's will happily do it for you.) Unbelievable.

Also, the Airport Extreme base station is up and running without a hitch. The extra $50 or so I spent on the Apple product was worth the money. | link

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