June 2006 Archives

[Moozik: The Stone Roses - Fools Gold]

Phew, what a hectic week.

Firstly there was the unfortunate stress of having Peaches put to sleep last Wednesday. She was 20 years old which is good for a cat. She had a good life but we didn't want her to suffer anymore than was necessary. That's about all I'm going to say about that as it's not fun to go through and not fun to read about either.

Then last Thursday we drove up to Santa Clara in California. We stayed there for 3 nights before driving a little further north to stay in San Francisco for a couple of days. I'll say more about the trip in another post except that we got back late last night after a 12 hour drive home and I'll quickly point out that the I-10 freeway from Phoenix to Los Angeles and the I-5 freeway from Los Angeles to San Jose are the most boring roads on the planet. Oh, and I own the record for most sunburned face. The after-sun lotion and I are becoming good friends :-)

[Moozik: Red Hot Chilli Peppers - Minor Thing]

Sometimes you just can't make this stuff up. Bad horror movie? Nope.

SALMON, Idaho (Reuters) - Police are charging an Idaho man with killing his wife after her severed head flew from the bed of his pickup truck during a crash that also claimed the lives of another woman and her child, officials said on Friday.

Man charged after wife's head flies from truck

[Moozik: Echo & The Bunnymen - Lips Like Sugar]

Ahh yes, Sunday mornings, there's nothing quite like the sound of your work pager going off to start the day out right. So after a vigorous rubbing of the eyes and slurping the first of many cups of coffee, the laptop booted and a couple of hours of fun commenced. Ahem. Once the work fires were nicely extinguished, it was time to get caught up on the weekend's sporting events obviously.

First on the agenda were the Men's & Women's finals from the French Open. I luuurve me some Tennis so I was quite happy for over 4 hours :-) I particularly enjoyed the excellent game between Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal. The Tennis high was swiftly followed by the Football low. Oh yes, the craptacular England vs Paraguay match. I suppose I'm happy that we got the 3 points but it was a far from impressive display. There is some work to be done in the England camp it would seem.

[Moozik: Joy Division - Incubation]

As seen today on the MySQL mailing list. Yes it amused the *nix geek in me somewhat.

>> This may be a really stupid question, but I hate looking stupid if I can
>> avoid it. :-)
>>
>> I have been using Microsoft SQL Server for a while, and I'm now trying to
>> switch all our applications over to use MySQL.  Microsoft SQL Server is
>> pronounced "Sequel Server".  Is MySQL pronounced "My Sequel", or is it
>> pronounced "My S-Q-L"?  I mean, generally speaking?
>
> Who cares how it's pronounced as long as you spell it right on the command
> line.  I mean, if you can't get it on the command line, you may as well call
> it a rock ;).

Ok. ;-}

ln -s /usr/local/mysql/bin/mysql /usr/bin/rock

[Moozik: Simple Minds - Glittering Prize]

So the only question for today is, should I buy the Ghostbusters shirt or the Flux Capacitor shirt?

Hmm...

[Moozik: The The - The Twilight Hour]

Worried that you've got too much free time on your hands? Well the Governor of Texas has just the thing for you. Imagine the excitement of sitting in front of your computer for hours at a time staring at the US/Mexico border on the lookout for illegal immigrants.

WEB users will be enlisted in the fight against illegal immigration by offering live surveillance footage of the US-Mexican border on the internet.

The plan will allow web users worldwide to watch the border of Texas with Mexico and phone the authorities if they see any apparently illegal crossings.

Texan Governor Rick Perry said the cameras would focus on common routes used to enter the US.

Mr Perry compared the effort with a neighborhood watch program and estimated the cost at $6.2 million.

US enlists the world to watch its border

[Moozik: The Cure - Catch]

I've got it. We'll wait for them to go on their excercise break in the courtyard and we'll fly a helicopter in. Brilliant! It's such a crazy plan, it just might work.

Oh wait, this isn't a bad movie script...

TWO dangerous criminals have staged a spectacular escape from Greece's top security prison. Guards were taken by surprise when a helicopter suddenly swooped down and landed in the jail courtyard, and then quickly took off with two prisoners.

Police said one of the escapees was Vassilis Paleokostas, a known gangster.

They say the escape was engineered by his brother Nikos, known as "the Phantom", who has been on the run for 10 years.

Phantom flies to jail rescue

[Moozik: Pist.On - Grey Flap]

While browsing Mastering Algorithms with Perl for a reference to sorting algorithms, I happened to stumble across this paragraph that made me smile.

But in Perl, arrays can vary in length dynamically. Extending, contracting, and reordering mechanisms are built into the language. The traditional costs of reorganizing arrays are swept under the rug, but Perl provides a very plush rug indeed and the sweepings are rarely large enough to be detectable.

[Moozik:Fixmer & Mccarthy - Freefall]

So last night marked the mini season finale of The Sopranos with the last 8 episodes to air next year. I can't help but feel a little disappointed with how things were left. No real cliffhanger to speak of, just a few hints of where the plot might lead in 2007. In fact, disappointed really sums up my reaction to this season in general.

I've been a fan since the very first episode and have to say that this season was perhaps the weakest to date. Over the course of the past few years, the show has been extremely consistent and was one of the main reasons I renew my HBO subscription every year. So what was missing this season? Good question and I can't really put my finger on it. What I can say is that more often than not I found myself thinking 'meh' after each episode. The season started out with some promise but, I dunno, never really seemed to go anywhere.

[Moozik:: The Clash - Clash City Rockers]

So, the mighty Arizona summer afternoon is upon us. Yes, that is my thermometer yesterday afternoon. 115° you say? Well, obviously I decided to mow the lawn. Ahem :-)

I think some of my mad dogs & Englishmen has passed to Sally. She came outside with Beers & moozik and we cooked homemade pizzas on the BBQ. To be honest, if we didn't have a misting system on the patio, we would not have lasted 5 minutes.

[Moozik: The The - Uncertain Smile]

It's the small things in life. I kid you not, found this very evening in an American grocery store: McVities Chocolate Digestives. I predict they will be all gone by this time tomorrow.