parlay

Birthdays

Questioning of Senor Tortuga
Originally uploaded by edfinn

It's been a hectic transition from the Bay area to Arizona, where we'll be holed up for the rest of the summer. Not necessarily reducing the hecticity, but definitely adding to the fun, is our new puppy! We haven't settled on a name yet, but you can just call him cute.

Flowers on Emerson

Flowers on Emerson
Originally uploaded by edfinn

I have a new camera. Anna has graduated from law school. We're going to Guatemala in a week. I finished a draft of my paper. I have the new Grand Theft Auto game.

Life is good.

Digital Fiction

I just came across a post on BoingBoing to some new digital fiction put together by Penguin. I'm excited about this for two reasons. First of all, each of the pieces (there are six in all) experiments with a different digital form. Second, a major publishing house is demonstrating interest in digital literature--great news for someone who's hoping to write, and write about, some digital lit himself one day. Aha: Dan's blogged this too.

(Crossposted from Professional Ed)

What We're Up Against Here

Inside Doune
Originally uploaded by edfinn

Apologies for any people out there still crazy enough to check this blog (or still have it in their RSS readers). I have my Orals on Tuesday. Life will be better after...hopefully.

Finally

Someone has finally developed an MP3 player that syncs music in time to your workout--in this case, the beating of your heart. I've long been of the opinion that matching up your running pace or other exercise routine with the pace of your music helps motivate you. One of my hare-brained schemes was to start a workout music consultancy with special mix tracks, complete with exhortations from the customer or Mr. T ("run, fool, run!").

Of course, the new Bodibeat does look a BIT like a horrific instrument of torture. But I'm sure it's not that bad once you insert the prongs and constrict the deathbelt around your face. Or whatever it is you're actually supposed to do.

Woe

Woe
Originally uploaded by edfinn

This is the space where my Xbox normally goes. It's the second time I've had to send mine back to Microsoft since I purchased one about a year ago. This time, at least, the whole process seems to be moving much faster.

After sending me a shipping container that became useless three weeks later (thus requiring a second shipping container--oh, the waste), they upgraded me to overnight service. So instead of waiting about five weeks like last time, the whole process will hopefully take about one week.

Also, to soothe my outrage, they sent me a free camera. Now I can show my tear-streaked face to the tweens who are stomping me on Xbox Live. Video chat, anyone?

Back in Town

Southern Arizona sunset
Originally uploaded by edfinn

We just returned from three weeks of Woden-celebrating, family-visiting, cookie-eating fun and we are ready for a nap. Unfortunately, our return coincided with a major storm and we spent the past 12 hours without power. So here's to home, sweet home, and volts, sweet volts!

ps The photo was taken on a highway south of Tucson.

Efficiency Envy

Last year UPS shaved 28.5 million miles off its delivery routes, saving about 3 million tons of gas and reducing CO2 emissions by 31,000 metric tons. How? Mostly by eliminating left turns on their routes.

I want them to use their "package flow" software on me. And my Christmas presents (please send presents).

END

No Room for Confusion
Originally uploaded by edfinn

That's right: another quarter is coming to a dramatic close, another year soon to follow it. It's been a very busy fall for me even though, erm, on paper I've accomplished rather little. But I think I'm still on target to get a few Great Things off my list this academic year, so that's good.

I also went through a bit of a fallow zone there in terms of work ethic, and I'm beginning to feel the old manic energy coursing through the hamster wheel. I didn't get much time off last summer and it turns out that 19 years of formal education have conditioned me to need that.

But not to worry. Soon, once again, I will be invincible.

The Semi-Finalist

I'm going to have to make a whole Tivo category. I submitted a joke personal ad for a contest held by the corporation I love the most and hate the least, Tivo. And now I'm a semi-finalist! (It's an honor just to be nominated.)

For the second round of the contest A and M helped me put together a 30-second personal video ad. You can see our entry (the one with "Phil Hearts Tivo" as its starting image) on the website here. I think you will agree that we dominate and totally deserve to win.

I Glory in my Pathetic Principles

I've just spent 20 minutes bickering with American Express over an (outrageous! indefensible!) $4.05 charge they're trying to stick me with. Anna says I must enjoy this on some level. Maybe she's right.

They're sending up a special report to the back office over my $4.05. Should I derive satisfaction from wasting at least three corporate employees' billable time on this, or should I feel stupid for wasting my own?

---UPDATE----
They refunded my money. Score one for pointless bickering.

Breaking Up is Hard to Do (Part II)

So I called Tivo again (see my previous attempt). This time they're giving me three months of free service. Who wants to buy a Tivo with three months of free service and the second season of Weeds on it? I'll give you a good deal!

Fine Dining

Delicious Pork Stir Fry
Originally uploaded by edfinn

We've been having some excellent grub around Casa Finn in recent weeks. Also, I left my camera on the dining room table for a while, so a few of them got documents. This is an amazing pork stir fry that Anna modified from some recipe. Those are fresh organic farm beans from our farm share on top. No, you can't have any.

ha HA!

DELETE
FROM `mt_comment`
WHERE comment_visible = 0

What does this mean? It means death to spammers, bots, and the shadowy evil-doers of the intertubes. It means "get rid of all my unpublished comment spam." It means freedom.

After some tinkering, I finally figured out the SQL command that would get rid of all the bad comments that have been cluttering up the back-end of this blog for years. This is what happened, and how long it took:

Deleted rows: 29244 (Query took 27.2919 sec)

I love/hate computers.

Sunset

Sunset
Originally uploaded by edfinn

As promised, a picture from the Maui trip. Indulgent? Perhaps. Necessary? Absolutely.