shwango! blog

i got image magick and perl magick (Image::Magick) installed so i can do thumbnails now! (as you can tell from my previous post.)

i should go to bed now…

check out this excerpt from microsoft’s eula just for installing security patches:

“You may not disclose the results of any benchmark test of the .NET Framework component of the OS Components to any third party without Microsoft’s prior written approval.”

finally, one of the most influential films of my life is coming out on dvd! koyannisqatsi, originally released in 1983, will be out on september 17th. amazon has a two pack of koyaanisqatsi and it’s sequel, powaqqatsi (which i’ve never seen) on special pre-order. the third film, naqoyqatsi is in production now.

i don’t remember the date exactly the first time i saw this film. i was still fairly young, maybe 15? i think i was in high school, but could’ve been earlier. the film is wonderful. the film has no dialog. it’s simply beautiful.

actually, the soundtrack by philip glass had an even greater impact on my life. (note: the dvd audio version of the soundtrack’s been out for a little while now and i highly recommend it!)

i don’t think i can express, in words, any more about this movie. see it.

by the way, koyannisqatsi is hopi indian for “life out of balance”.

i’m turning into a ebay junkie – or lurker, i guess, seeing as i haven’t actually bought anything yet. as you may know, i’m a huge depeche mode fan. i’ve even got a site set up – although a bit neglected nowadays – and have many 12″ “rare” singles and cds. (i’ll post some cool items some time.) i never got into the ebay thing, but a friend sent me a link to a dm item on ebay – after that i had to see what else was on there. i can’t belive it! there a ton of stuff out there, some good, some bad.

so anyway… i came across an item and to follow up on it’s authenticity i searched the web for it and came across it in some guy’s collection which he displays online. then it turns out he has the one single that i could’ve bought many years ago, but opted for something else.

this single has haunted me for years. i saw it many years ago – like 15 or so – at a (now defunct) record shop in clifton called culture 7. i used to go there all the time to get dm singles. that day i had only about five bucks to spend so it was between dm and the brand new and first skinny puppy single “dig it”. skinny puppy had just come out and i had read about them so it thought i’d try it. i did like the single, but man, i wish i’d bought the dm one.

turns out that’s a promo single of the classic “blasphemous rumors” track. that cover haunted me. i knew sort of what it looked like but didn’t know the details – then, when i saw that page, it all came back in an instant. i know it sounds corny, but i do love my dm!

the other day i posted about a pringles can antenna to boost wireless access. well, i just came across instructions for building one.

i managed to munge my site-style.css file last night while trying to modify the blog fonts… and then when i mv’d my backup file back in place, i munged that too! oh well, looks better now – at least on windows. linux still needs some work on its fonts.

although i’m no css guru, i have been trying to move away from the font tags and such. but i do wish i could do global variables for fonts and stuff – i think maybe i heard full css 2.0 does that. i mean if i want to change my font family, it’s usually for a set or range of display elements on a page, so i can change it in one place and there you’d have it. guess i should investigate…

i think this is the first official entry from out on the deck! i’m addicted to this wireless stuff, man. i’m at the edge of the deck and still – barely, though – getting a signal at 11mbps.

we all know the wap11 access point kicks major ass, but some people say that the linksys cards give them problems. i’ve never had any, though. maybe it’s the pci cards, but my pcmcia works like a charm – although i haven’t had much luck with linux and wep… i use ssh/scp for most secure stuff anyway.

if only this vaio battery lasted longer…

some guy in colorado set up a wap11 with a better antenna (note: a modified pringles can) at the top of a mountain and now he provides anyone in the town in the valley below with free wireless internet access! (ok, that little town is aspen!) what a guy! npr’s morning edition did a story about it too.

looks like the cat’s harassing some birds…

ok, let’s see if this works…

sweet! i’m back in business with mt! i love open source support forums!

btrott posted: (included sig ’cause it’s so cool)

It sounds like a bad upgrade… you might want to try re-uploading your ‘tmpl’ directory.
————–
“And don’t tell me there isn’t one bit of difference between null and space, because that’s exactly how much difference there is.” — Larry Wall

then i posted:

thanks, that did it! i guess i am an idiot. i must have forgot the -r when i cp’d the tmpl dir from my temp directory. sorry for the trouble! i swear i checked that already!

ok, here’s a screen shot of the bug. (popup image)