hmm... improving even today

March 08, 2004 by Eric Richardson

Still not great, but I noticed things seemed a little faster so I checked it out and now I'm seeing an average around 300ms. That's the type of thing that makes me think these big ping times were just an aberation.

wifi: Hennessey's Tavern at Hermosa Beach

March 08, 2004 by Eric Richardson

I'm hanging out at Hennessey's Tavern in Hermosa Beach, online via free wifi provided by Hermosawave. The location is amazing, right on the end of Pier Ave (where it's just a pedestrian walkway). The ocean is maybe 100 yards of beach away. They have outdoor seating, and also rooftop seating, but to avoid the glare I set up at a bar-type table inside. There's a great breeze wandering in, and they're even playing good music. The staff's great, very friendly. A full battery is pretty essential: I can't really see a power outlet anywhere. I had a full battery, though, and wasn't expecting power, so that didn't faze me.

The connectivity, though, is all over the place. I'm getting some normal ping times, but more often than not I'm getting times in the 3500ms range. The first time I ran a bandwidth test it showed me 450kbps, the second time 50. I'm hoping this is just an aberation. I dropped an email to Hermosawave, so we'll see what they have to say.

If the latency issue resolves itself, this is definitely a place I could see myself frequenting. They've got Guinness, the ocean, and free wifi. What else I'd need, I just don't know.

(Update: see the comments for a little more info on the latency issues.)

this is life

March 07, 2004 by Eric Richardson

It's hard to complain about life when it's 80 degrees and clear blue skies outside. Standing out on my balcony I have a clear view of west LA, the Hollywood sign, downtown, and snow-covered mountain peaks off to the east. The microwave is beeping at me to let me know that my leftovers from the best resturant in LA are ready. Sure, I've got a midterm and a paper that should be weighing me down this week. Sure, I've got to change up my schedule to get into the health center Monday to get my stitches checked on. But you know, I really don't care. It's too nice out to care.

the damage?

March 06, 2004 by Eric Richardson

Seven stitches. I was thinking three, but uh, I was wrong. That's why she's the one doing the stitching and not me. I went to Good Samaritan Hospital, which I didn't realize it, but is actually affiliated with USC. I got there about 4:30, got triaged about 4:45, and then got called in at 5:15 or so. I was out by 6, so really the whole process wasn't that bad. The lady who stitched me up (who stitches in an ER? A nurse? A doctor?) and office staff were very friendly. She said I was her third set of stitches above the eyebrow today.

another day another trip to the ER?

March 06, 2004 by Eric Richardson

So I was wakeboarding today. It was great out. I had even skied first. And then I had to go and put a gash right above my eye. Either my knee or the side of the board did this, and I really don't understand the dynamics of either. So now I'm off to the ER for stitches... Woo hoo! Just how I wanted to spend my Saturday evening.

prior art: the wheel

March 05, 2004 by Eric Richardson

Yesterday Topher outlined features he wants in a future version of the software he's written to run his blog. The first comment echoed my thoughts while reading: why? Why go to all the work of writing your own software when other packages already exist and do a great job? Then I went, oh, wait... I do that.

Granted, my reasons are a little different. I moved this blog to eThreads on April 19, 1999. Movable Type 0.1 wouldn't be released until September 23, 2001. Blogger predated that, but still didn't launch until August, 1999. So there really wasn't much else out there when I first made the changes to customize a version of eThreads to do news instead of forums.

But the core question is one that I still ask myself, a lot: Why should I not port what I'm doing to something like MT and just get in with the trends?

I think really my answer is that I just don't see a reason to. eThreads is for me a perfect platform. Over the years the architecture has evolved into something that's really fun to work with. When there's a new feature I want I can use some nice hooks to be able to plug in and make things happen really easily. A couple weeks ago I wanted support for XML/RPC pings to be able to ping blogrolling. Writing the code to do so in a clean, extensible way took a couple hours.

Were I starting from scratch, I'd definitely get on the MT bandwagon and start developing extensions onto it. I think they're doing some really cool stuff. But I'm not starting from scratch, or even looking at a situation where I need to add a lot of things at once. And in that case, I'm perfectly content sitting where I'm at.

restoring the rings

March 05, 2004 by Eric Richardson

I was sitting in "my office" on the Annenberg patio for several hours yesterday. While there I overheard a Daily Trojan reporter conduct the interview for this story about rings from the 1984 Olympics being restored. Other coverage in the LA Times.

winds of change

March 04, 2004 by Eric Richardson

The pastels look lasted November through February, but it was time for a change. The image is from this picture. To answer the obvious questions, yes, that's me, and yes, I did mean to do that. You'll notice that my form is quite good.

This look, for no apparent reason, is titled style.

modern technology

March 04, 2004 by Eric Richardson

Walking to Carl's, I noticed two facilities people looking at a TV monitor. I thought that was kind of odd; while there's always filming going on at USC, usually it's not the maintenance people doing it. Looking closer, though, they were using a tool called a SeeSnake. Aside from the monitor, they also had a spool of cable, one end of which was stuck down into a presumably clogged drainage pipe. That end contained a camera and a light, and they were using it to scope out the source of the blockage. That's cool stuff. I want one.

ah the sun

March 04, 2004 by Eric Richardson

It's been a long time since it was nice outside... Finally yesterday and today have brought some sunshine and nice temps. I'm sitting here in the shadow of Annenberg (to prevent glare on the laptop), enjoying the smell of outdoors. I'm listening to Martina Topley Bird's Quixotic, which I'm addicted to right now.

I recently picked up a box of Penguin Reds, and I think I'm getting re-addicted to those too. Way back when (over five years ago now? Crazy) I was involved in a little controversy over these mints. They are good, especially the cinnamons.

Now it's off to Carl's Jr. for my regular five piece chicken strips meal with honey mustard and a bottle of coke. USC's a Pepsi campus, and the Carl's on campus recently switched to Pepsi products for their fountain drinks, but they still carry bottles of Coke products that they'll give you for a little bit more. I can't stand Pepsi, or Pepsi products (Mountain Dew excepted, but I will say that it's not that great as a fountain drink).

Speaking of things I don't like: I don't like Taco Bell. I love Del Taco, though, and I thought it was really funny that Jack Black and Wil Farrell used Del Taco in their song during the Oscars. Of all the national chains or products they could have mentioned, how funny is it that they instead use a very regional chain that most of the country has never heard of? I just found that interesting.

roundup time

March 03, 2004 by Eric Richardson

Whenever I've been putting off work or bored lately, I've been wandering over to LA Blogs and clicking around to some of the most recently updated sites on the blogroll. Trying to figure out why my site didn't show up updated there was even the impetus behind writing XML/RPC ping support for eThreads. The blog part of LA Blogs might not update all that often, but the site is invaluable if just for that blogroll.

In the 5+ years I've been doing this site, this is the first time I've made a post on a March 3rd. That got me wondering how many days of the year I have covered and how many I've missed. I didn't have to wonder long, though... In 5+ years I've posted on 322 of 366 possible dates. The next upcoming gap? March 13 and 14, and then the 17th and 18th. I missed a big-time chance on Sunday, neglecting to post on Feb 29. That one will take a while now.

CRM114 training is going well. This morning it had missed two spam and marked a Speakeasy invoice incorrectly. It filed 100+ spam correctly overnight, though. It's still not to the point that I would go without checking my crm-spam folder, but it's getting better and is already doing better than spamassassin was at the end.

productivity. me. separate ends of the universe.

March 02, 2004 by Eric Richardson

I've been "writing" a paper all morning on "extra-cinematic cultural products and leisure acitivities" in postmodern Hollywood cinema. The only thing I've managed to do well so far is use a Simpsons reference as my intro:

A recent Simpsons episode opened with a movie inside the Springfield Googolplex. Soldiers are seen landing on a beach, gunfire flashing around them. A storming soldier stands over a slain foe, and then reaches into his foe's pocket and pulls out -- a buzz cola. Voiceover tells the audience, "Buzz Cola -- the taste you'll kill for." The dead soldier leans up to add in a German accent, "Available in ze lobby!" Lisa is appalled. She asks, "Do they really think cheapening the memory of our veterans will sell soda?" Almost before she can finish her question Homer is rising from his seat: "I have to go to ze lobby!"

Lisa is objecting to a central element of post-modern cinema. Though present to some extent in other eras of film, postmodern cinema has made extra-cinematic elements integral to all aspects of the movie-making process.

I then go on to talk about nothing, but my Simpsons reference quota is fulfilled so that's not as bad as it could be. I really need to write 4 pages or so in the next two hours.