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Birds Before The Storm Magpie's blog. Follow link to Birds Before The Storm  Arizona Breast Cancer 3-Day This November, Laura Duncan is participating in a 3-Day 60 mile walk to raise funds to fight breast cancer. Please consider donating to support her. Proceeds go to the Susan G. Komen Foundation and the National Philanthropic Trust. Follow link to Arizona Breast Cancer 3-Day Google Finance Google Finance offers a broad range of information about stocks, mutual funds, public and private companies. In addition, Google Finance offers interactive charts, news and fundamental data. Follow link to Google Finance October 6, 2008 Finance This is going to be an ugly day, financially. The DJIA is down to a little over 9,500. Man vs. Pee Machine Switched from Tidy Cats to Scoop Away. Tomorrow will scoop before work. Progress will be noted here.
Pure Data Pure Data is a real-time graphical dataflow programming environment for audio, video, and graphical processing. Follow link to Pure Data October 5, 2008 PDF Art project with Justin, learning Pure Data.
October 4, 2008 American Diabetes Association Walk Bike mobile. Columbia Heights Festival Not exactly what we expected, but there was a camel. Dinner with Mike Calderone Great to catch up. Bowling with Emily They made me leave my bike helmet on a table outside.
Michael Calderone's Blog Michael Calderone writes on political media for Politico. Follow link to Michael Calderone's Blog October 3, 2008 Wachovia Had a $22 overdraft on my checking account in spite of having asked to have my overdraft protection activated in April. Bank manager fixed everything in a ten minute conversation and refunded the overdraft fee. The check in question cleared without an issue. Board Game Night Was awesome, more later.
October 2, 2008 Geekery Ask me anything about Web Parts. Seriously. I haven't thought about anything else for the last 24 hours. Dodgeball We got trounced, bad. Nalgene I bought a new Nalgene bottle from REI to be sure I had one for tonight and discovered that they are now selling exclusively Bisphenol-A-free plastic versions in the old polycarbonate form factor. No idea if they are more or less the same sturdiness, but I'll find out over the next few weeks. Instead of polycarbonate they are using Eastman Tritan copolyester. No word on the availability of the old-style Nalgene bottles going forward. I think its very likely to depend on the durability of these new ones. Thanks to Lauren for pointing out that there have always been non-polycarbonate bottles in the Nalgene brand line. Man vs. Pee Machines Sparkling clean litter boxen seem to have eliminated most badness.
October 1, 2008 Man vs. Pee Machine This morning while I was getting ready for work, Dot peed in my laundry basket, thoroughly drenching my "Ehrlich for Governor" tee-shirt. While I can't argue with her taste, she's locked in the bathroom with a fresh box of litter, food and water. Any advice is appreciated.
September 30, 2008 Finance Strong opening to the stock market today, hopefully it holds to the end of the day and I get some of "my" money back. Unfortunately it seems that as a result of my spending this week I'll have to hit up savings for $101.32 to pay my bills this week. It's not a huge deal, but its a sign I need to tighten the belt a little tighter. Sleep Schedule Was up and jumped out of bed and into the shower at 0700. Was at the office and seated at my desk a few minutes after 0800 with a large Caribou coffee and muffin in my hand. Success! Man vs. Pee Machine All the aluminum foil was disturbed and there was pee on the plastic covering over the white couch. None appears to have penetrated below. I am slightly behind on litter box cleaning but not enough to matter. Leaning towards getting her a new friend, but not until after PDF when we would have time to bond for sure.
Achieving Legendary
Follow link to Achieving Legendary September 29, 2008 Finance Unless you've been living under a rock today, you know the Dow Jones Industrial Average lost 777 points after the house failed to pass the bailout bill as written. Considering the last time we were graced with swift reactive governance we got the USA Patriot Act, I could stand to see a few more days of the markets down 7% if that's what the deliberative process of the republic requires. I know they're not going to get this right per se but at least they can get it less wrong than an unsupervised playground of 700 billion tax dollars for folks who have shown a remarkable lack of ability to grasp basic ledger sheets. Personally, I "lost" about $1,700 today in my retirement, but I have forty years to get it back so I'm not all that worried. Birthday Today I took off from work for my birthday. My company gives it out as a recognized holiday. I slept until 14:30, then ate and surfed the web until it was time to enjoy a nice chicken and pasta dish and a brownie sundae down in Fells Point. I feel very relaxed after what was a pretty hectic weekend. Tomorrow I put my nose back down to the grindstone. Kitten Blogging Dot loves apples and will run from whatever room she is in to where I am if she hears me bite into one. Then she'll sit on my lap until I bite her off a piece and then eat it out of my hand. I checked everywhere I could on the Internet and nobody says that they are bad for her, so finally we have something we can share. She also has no idea what a mirror is, and has been attacking her reflection in both my office and the bedroom with alarming regularity.
September 28, 2008 The voices in my head are singing in harmony to an unwritten Stephen Sondheim song. Man vs. Pee Machine The two chairs with no aluminum foil on them got peed on again, in spite of the fact that there's no way to smell the existing pee through the plastic. She must be doing this as a matter of habit. I added aluminum foil to both those chairs. The couches have not seen any pee since I added the foil to them. I'm making sure that the first thing I do when I get back into the house is to give the cat a good twenty minutes of attention, and that usually fends off any immediate retaliatory strikes for being out too late or too long. If things are still an issue the next weekend after Playa del Fuego I might consider getting another kitten from the Maryland SPCA. The other alternative would be to move all upholstered furniture from the ground floor (or the house entirely) in favor of the company of the kitten. BSSC Dodgeball The first game of BSSC dodge ball with Tanza's team really did a number on my body, just like the first game of soccer. I think figuring out the right pre-game stretches and bringing enough water for myself will make a difference. I'm definitely looking forward to the next game and hopefully going to one of the pre- or post-game social events. This may be the way to get me through a few weeks of the winter and cold-weather cardiovascular exercise slump. There's no standing still in dodge-ball. Everyone had to pick a (super)villain name for the back of their official team tee-shirt. I chose Mr. Pink from Reservoir Dogs. Rebecca and Phil's Wedding A resounding success. I can't wait to see some of the pictures that other folks took of the ceremony and afterwards because, a dozen people took the time to tell me how good I looked, and a different half dozen asked me if I were running for office. Hopefully once Phil is allowed to leave the marital bed he'll do his good geek duty of collecting all the digital photographs from wedding guests in one place so I can browse through give myself some new user icons and profile pictures. In spite of the fact that I don't wear them often, I wear a suit and tie quite well. My speech was well received. I didn't get any applause and people looked a little shell-shocked at the end, but a few folks came up and told me how nice it was. I'm sure there's video floating around that I will get to see and wince at. Birthday A few people remembered it was my birthday. The one birthday card I got in the mail was from my office. I don't sweat it though. I'll make a huge fuss over my 30th, so I have no problem with the fact that my 29th was a very reserved occasion. I did get to spend all of the day with some great friends ? and give a speech, so I have no regrets. Also, I'm now 29, which feels not a day different than 28. Sleep Schedule Currently anywhere from 3am to 11am or 4pm to noon or later. Hoping this morning will be the day I can actually leap out of bed at 7am and reset the schedule. It took a while to get this deep in the hole, so I'm not really optomistic about a quick change back. House Cleaning In anticipation of Kathleen E. maybe needing a couch to crash on, I cleaned up both floors of the house and retrieved most of the camping gear from the basement. Found that one of the plastic storage boxes had either a crack in it or one of the towels wicked up a ton of water into the box. Luckily it was all non-important items that I'll attempt to bleach once in the washing machine and dispose of if that's not successful. Seven large bags of garbage are out on the curb, and a bunch more will join them next week. Playa del Fuego With less than two weeks to go before the event, I have most of the parts for my art project either promised or secured. Once I make a quick trade with Justin for some hardware and fire gear, I'll only have a trip to Home Depot remaining and a few hours work in the backyard to nail everything together. I have a good feeling about this one. Plans for the Zelda's Inferno camp are continuing apace. Personal Net Worth Ticker Certainly much more interesting than I expected it to be, and I got to learn enough of jpgraph to render everything on my home page. Overall Fitness I've been really bad about eating right lately, but my weight is still up at a relatively solid 143.5 pounds. Need to keep the cardiovascular exercise in spite of the lowering temperatures, but I'm confident this season will be easier. West Wing End of season two. A rain soaked President Bartlett just put his hands in his pockets and looked to the side. All three Netflix envelopes go out with the Monday mail, so I should have replacements for all three by Wednesday or Thursday. Nobody in conversation seems to understand who Sam Seaborn is, which is a shame because he's a perfect metaphor for the way I get when I'm knee deep into an important bit of writing.
reddit What's new online. Follow link to reddit September 25, 2008 Happy birthday to Steve K. and Gabe M. Many happy returns! It is depressing to watch my net worth trickle lower over the course of two week on my nifty new graphs. I'm hoping I might have made a little investment money today, but I'm not exactly counting on it.
September 24, 2008
Annenberg Political Fact Check A nonpartisan, nonprofit, "consumer advocate" for voters that aims to reduce the level of deception and confusion in U.S. politics. Follow link to Annenberg Political Fact Check Darrell Duane Link to the weblog of Darrell Duane. Follow link to Darrell Duane No Impact Man Tree hugging lunatic in New York City. Follow link to No Impact Man September 23, 2008
September 22, 2008 
September 21, 2008 I don't feel guilty about taking a day for myself once in a while. Today I watched DVDs most of the day on the laptop in bed and then went to the store for a box of cookies and ice cream, which I enjoyed thoroughly. How was your day?
September 19, 2008 My exercise is paying off. At the risk of sounding boastful, I feel and look better now than I have at any point before in my life. I've got muscle definition and bulk in places I've never had much of anything before, and I can easily do 25 push-ups at a clip. I've put on 20 pounds since three months ago and haven't gained an inch around my waist, although my suit jackets are a bit tight around the shoulders now. It's not a far stretch to think that by mid-December I could add another ten pounds to my frame and 30 pounds to my lifting capacity without changing my routine. This makes me very happy.
September 18, 2008 Sleep is for the weak! Currently listening to: Pop Stream - Into Orbit (Atomic Pulse Rmx) | V.A. - Multiverse
September 17, 2008 Happy Constitution Day! Major market indicators are down 3.4% at 3:45pm. This will be another annoyingly depressing day for my net worth. The kitten was so upset that I was out from 11am until 9pm and left all the lights in the house out that as soon as I got home and checked the mail, she stood on the nice couch and peed all over one of the cushions while staring at me. I caught her right away so after placing her firmly in the litter box I locked her in the bathroom for a half hour and spent that time liberally applying cat urine remover spray to every wet surface and removing the foam cushions. Apparently she's peed on one of the cushions before and I didn't notice (there was a wet spot under the cushions that she couldn't have possibly hit in the seconds that she was peeing and not airborne) and there was no color stain and minimal odor so I'm hoping the new couch is just naturally resilient to cats. Although I don't want to generally reward this behavior, this is intentional (not confused) peeing on things that just means she needs more company during the day. This does bode well for her getting a new friend from the SPCA soon.
September 16, 2008  To address my answers to the issues that I posted on the 12th, I did take Richard's advice on revitalizing my Getting Things Done lists and trying to focus the things in my professional life. For the most part, I was already doing this. I print out a page every morning called my "Focus Sheet" that details the projects I'm working on and discrete actions that I need to take during the day. It's not perfect and it can ramble on at times with scratch notes and pasted in paragraphs from e-mails but its better than nothing. What helped me most was taking a page out of the Extreme Programming Pocket Guide by chromatic and dividing my tasks out into chunks with similarly sized estimates on them. I seem to be struggling most with the mid-range or 24-72 hour view1 in accomplishing tasks and getting feedback and reward for accomplishing them. I started working on a pile of similarly sized tasks and calculating my project velocity, I was able to imagine myself having an impact on the completion time of the furthest task by lowering the average actual time. For each two hour task out of twenty that I was able to complete in 60 minutes or less, the average estimated time remaining (based on my new velocity factor of 2) would drop in a very gratifying fashion. On the other hand, if I let my mind wander or get distracted in the middle of a task, I wouldn't stop the timer. I would simply realize that if I kept up that awful rate and lowered my velocity factor anywhere below 1, I would be giving up that time later when the inevitable tasks at the end still had to be done -- and adding to the time I was stuck at my desk having those tasks knocking on my psyche. So that's pretty cool. I also managed to set aside a few minutes for myself and redo the design and layout of the front page of vees.net to something more interesting and useful. The net worth stock tickers I mentioned the other day are posted up there, along with a few of my more interesting pictures to break up the monotony of black on white. Also the feeds have changed. If you were using the old XML feeds for my blog that were hosted on vees.net, they're all now in the /feeds/ directory of epistolary.org. If you are able to, please change their location in your feed readers, otherwise you'll hit vees.net and be 301 redirected over to epistolary.org with every refresh. It's not a huge deal but it will save you time and save me CPU cycles. But enough technobabble. Life's good, the cooler weather is helping my sleep a ton because I can wrap myself in a huge pile of blankets and not wake up either all sweaty in the morning or shivering in the middle of the night or both. This makes me happy, although the cooler mornings make it harder than usual to get out of bed in the mornings. If I can get a good night's sleep it will only be a matter of a psychological barrier to get started in the morning, not a physical one. Now the sun is setting earlier and earlier and the suburbanites are locking themselves inside around 7:30 or 8:00 in the evening, leaving dark suburban streets all to me for my evening bike ride around the neighborhood. It's so lovely to hear nothing but the hum of the tires and the occasional dog barking in the distance. Makes me want to go out again even more the next evening. The ACLU sent me my "I am a Constitution Voter" bumper sticker. I'm still not ready to plaster my car with political propaganda that can't be easily removed (like my Obama trunk magnet), but it fits perfectly and proudly on the back cover of my Eee PC. I'm sure most ACLU members are only referring to the nine out of ten amendments in the Bill of Rights that they don't talk circles around themselves trying to "de-individualize." I'm happy to throw my support behind all those and the individualized second amendment at no additional charge. 1 Prospective in its noun form seems to be a great word to use to mean "the state of looking ahead," in the same way you can use perspective to mean a point of view. Why can I only find it as an adjective in the dictionary? Is there a better word that fits there? Am I stuck with "prospective perspective?"
September 15, 2008 Tonight I successfully completed the first three-tier deployment of vees.net. Thanks to everybody who helped me beta test. When I got home today I felt like making a small change to the front page of my site and adding a "net worth ticker" to my site to show the percentage trend of my calculated net worth over a trend period of 24 hours, 7, 30, and 365 days. Unfortunately I had promised myself a few weeks ago that I wouldn't touch the production version of my site without first developing it through the other two tiers and finishing the development of the new gallery site. With that, I had locked myself out of coding random things just for fun. Instead I looked around and figured out all the things I needed to do to wipe away the old vees.net code and replace it with one of the trimmed and version-controlled revisions of the development code without breaking anything. I found all the spots where things didn't work quite right after being shuffled around and loaded into source control, patched that up and deployed the site to the staging server to check that all my configuration options were correct. The staging push did reveal a couple of small static URL lines I had left in by accident, and a quick update to development side and another push and I placed the site out for a half dozen friends to check for errors. Once enough had played around and everything appeared to be working, I erased the old production site and replaced it with revision 16 of my development version as an svn export. After that was all finished, I went ahead and coded the little ticker app on the development pages to evaluate for a week or so before I push it out with the next iteration.
September 14, 2008 One side of a telephone conversation: Slow down I can hardly hear you. My reception is bad because the train is in a tunnel. Did you say there's a wire on your toes? You shot crease on your pain? How did that cause your toe to get caught on a tire? Stop yelling! I can hardly understand a word. There's grapes on the mire? What? Crepes esquire? You're not making any sense. I don't think we know a choir singer. What does that have to do with your tires? You need a choir singer because there's a mime in the stitching? Please stop crying. Aspire? Aspire to what? The itching is inspired? You're going to call the Squires Apartments? Wait, we're coming out of the tunnel, don't hang up yet. The mole's spouse is enmired? Wait I can hear you clearly now, you say the whole house is on f... oh crap. (Not a true story) Tonight's weigh in is a stunning high of 143.5 lbs. My goal was to gain 20 lbs of muscle mass by September 17, and I've met it quite adequately.
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Hi, I'm Rob Carlson. I'm a 29 year old software developer born and raised in the suburbs of New Jersey and currently living and working in the suburbs of Baltimore, Maryland. I enjoy going to talks I find in the City Paper on topics I know nothing about, hanging out with my friends in the park, taking hundreds of pictures a month, writing every day, bike riding on trails and around town, keeping up on local politics, doing stuff with the folks in my neighborhood to make it a better place, drinking coffee, drinking beer, cooking (poorly for now, but I keep trying), pistol shooting, ham radio, camping whenever I get the chance, and being a geek. My goals in life are to harness the best technology available to solve problems, shatter bottlenecks, do cool stuff, get things done, impress my peers, lead by example, and change the world. Contact info:
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