I'm pleased to report that the new "Sweet Mint" flavor of Orbit gum has made its way to Southern California.
It's the little things, you know?
That's right. You may remember I wrote about the Google puzzle contest tie-in with the Da Vinci Code movie. Well, I'm a finalist. Me and a scant 9,999 others.
I was fairly optimistic that I could make it to be a finalist. I think I'm probably faster than some when it comes to many kinds of puzzles, and I guessed that from the pool of people out there who would bother solving 24 heavily movie and Google promoting puzzles to enter a long shot contest (you see what I'm getting at; I don't think we're talking millions of contestants, here), I stood a good shot of being one of the first 10,000 to finish.
Now, however, the pond is smaller and the average fish size has gone up. Only one will win. I don't know what to expect of the puzzles, but I'm thinking it'll come down to some luck: either I'll solve the final puzzles quickly, or I won't. Fastest out of 10,000 puzzle solvers? Only if I'm lucky.
I've had fun playing, though. Can't argue with that.
We're undertaking a new project this summer. If you think I'm talking about prepping for the arrival of our first child, you aren't far off, but I'm talking about something else. We're adding a room to our house. Well, two rooms, really.
Even back when we had just decided that we wanted to start trying to get pregnant, we realized that we would need more (or different) room than our house currently provides. The first, most obvious place to put a baby is in what is now my office. That's all fine and dandy, but I work from home, so need a place to do so. I could set up a desk in what is now our dining room, but it is not really separate from the kitchen or even the living room. If my desk were there, I can't imagine how I would get much work done.
So we investigated adding on to our house. (We did consider moving, too, but felt we wanted to do that even less than building out.) We could add a small office, or a new bedroom and bathroom. The initial cost estimates were actually not all that far off, so we figured if we're going to do it, let's do the one that might actually add some value to the house.
We've been working with the architect since January (we met once in November, but we began in earnest in January). Today we signed an agreement with a general contractor. I'm calling this Day 1, for this purposes of this blog. I'll try to post updates throughout the process. The current estimate is that the job will take around 4 months. Obviously we'd love it if it got done before the baby comes, but we expect there to be a month or more of overlap.
So that's the story up to this point. Stay tuned for further adventures....
A shadowy flight into the dangerous world of a man who does not exist....
Found a video of a live performance of level 1-1 of Super Mario Bros. If you remember playing this game at all, you'll get a kick out of this video. Cleverly recreated.
Watch the video. It's 2-3 minutes long.
Check out the trailer for "An Inconvenient Truth", a film about the life and environmental message of Al Gore (who "used to be the next President of the United States of America").
I've read and heard from people who have heard Gore give recent talks featured in the film, and the consensus is something like "expected a dry speech, but found it captivating and motivating." Seems hearing this message can get you fired up.
Judging from the trailer, it's definitely something I'll try to see.
The latest web distraction to steal a few minutes of my day: Weboggle.
There's a new game every 3 minutes or so, you can see scores from other users (some of whom are cheating as teams and others must be cheating somehow, I just know it), and with scores comes a list of words you didn't get (as well as words only you got, but that hasn't happened to me yet).
Everytime I'm there, I have to say "just one more game" at least three times before I can actually leave. If you try it out, I'm usually there as "Ken"; look for me in the lower half of the scores list.
Google, in what I think may be their first promotional partnership of this kind, is hosting a puzzle challenge related to the upcoming release of The Da Vinci Code movie.
A new puzzle is released every day for 24 days (this is day 2). They say the puzzles will get progressively more challenging. Once those 24 puzzles are out, the first 10,000 people to submit answers get a 'replica' (I'm guessing cheap and plastic) of a codex from the book/movie. Those 10,000 people are finalists, and they have to solve 5 more puzzles. The winner gets a bounty of Sony goodies, and a trip to the major cities from the story: New York, Paris, Rome, and London.
I'm playing along for now; I like puzzles anyway, and a short daily puzzle never hurt anyone. I do hope they get a little tougher as time goes by, though.
If you're wondering "how they get you", it's this: to play, you have to have or establish a Google ID (free), and to play the puzzles you have to visit Google's Personalized home page. That's what's in it for Google; anyone playing will have to visit the personalized home page, possibly every day. If Google can convince new users to stick around and try the home page, that's eventually good news for them; they could someday have AdWords ads based on your home page content. Google's Personalized home page has some nice features, but I haven't made it my home page, and I've known about it for a while.
Anyway, if you are interested in the Google/Da Vinci puzzle challenge, you start here: http://www.google.com/davincicode.
Started my Sunday morning by watching this video. (Found via O'Reilly Radar.)
Wow. Watch the video; it's only a couple minutes long. Chris Bliss makes this remarkable juggling routine look so effortless and fun. As Tim O'Reilly said in his post, it's a reminder of what humans are capable of.
UPDATE: I'm reading more and learning that apparently this video has provoked angry responses from people who say they "know juggling." I don't claim to be up to date on the current top jugglers. Here's a video of a guy doing a routine to the same music (the exact same audio, actually, with applause), but with 5 balls instead of 3. He's demonstrating that the first video doesn't really display technically difficult juggling, and in fact he's making fun of the "muppet seizure" movements.
I enjoyed this second demo as well, and I can't argue that this probably demonstrates greater technical skill, but the Chris Bliss video is sufficiently beyond my ability to deserve respect, and to me the expressiveness in his face and body add a great deal to the performance. Maybe I'm an easy audience, I don't know.
Every year the Museum of Television & Radio hosts the William S. Paley Television Festival. For about two weeks, a dozen or so evenings are presented, each celebrating a different modern or classic TV show or personality. The evening includes a screening of an episode, typically, followed by a panel discussion with the creative team behind the show, which typically includes the show's creators, producers, and some of the cast.
We couldn't go to any of last year's festival, but this year we made it to three evenings: Battlestar Galactica, Medium, and My Name is Earl. All three were fun. The Earl evening was probably the most lively, though the Battlestar Galactica crowd was pretty vocal (and they knew their trivia). For Earl, they screened a couple of as-yet-unaired episodes, and the panel was lively and funny.
Any of you reading this is LA, the Paley festival is something I recommend taking advantage of. It's pretty much the first two weeks of March every year. I've gone to 7 or 8 evenings all told, and I always enjoy it. I've never gotten there early enough to watch the press meet-n-greet with panelists, or stayed late enough to go to the stage and try and talk with any of them, but that's also possible, if that's something you'd like to do.
Dana and I went to see Kristin Chenoweth in concert at Disney Hall this weekend. Loved it.
For starters, this was our first visit to Disney Hall. Very nice. Dana didn't like the carpet or seat covers, but otherwise we were pretty impressed. Considering it is a large hall, it doesn't feel cavernous, and most of the seats don't feel like they're far from the stage. (This is a good thing, because Dana and I were behind the stage in the second row from the top; I wasn't quite on the ball with getting these tickets.)
If you don't know who Kristin is (yes, I'm going to pretend we're on a first name basis), here's a bit of background: she's a Tony winner for playing Sally in You're a Good Man Charlie Brown, and a Tony nominee for playing Galinda in Wicked. She's small, southern, with long blonde hair and a speaking voice that's distinctively high and edgy. She was in the TV musical movies Annie and The Music Man. Most recently, she's been on The West Wing for the last couple of seasons as Annabeth, a media consultant for the administration.
She's got classical voice training, and she can use it. She has a fun mix where she can use an operatic soprano head voice and quickly cut in with an edge from her chest voice. And she can really perform; she doesn't sit still much, and her presence onstage is great. (And most of the time I saw her back.) I wasn't equally crazy about each of her song choices, but all in all they were great. There were a few showtunes, some cabaret pieces (is there a better name for that genre?), an aria from Candide, and a song made famous by Styx. Quite a mix.
Alanis Morrisette made a guest appearance to sing a duet from Wicked ("For Good"). Now I wouldn't call myself an Alanis fan in that I don't follow news or projects of hers, but I do own and enjoy her music. It was kind of fun to have her there (Kristin seemed to be a big fan), but I didn't feel like her vocal style really served the song. Maybe I'm too attached to Idina Menzel's vocal. Still, the song, which I can't help but endow with the emotional background from the show, was quite moving.
If you're ever given the chance to see her perform, I recommend it. She's got charm shining out of her pores (I guess 'oozing out' is the more common phrase, but doesn't really seem to have the right feeling). I'm sure in person she's got a little bit of diva in her (how could she not), but she sure comes across as a sweet southern girl, who can sing like no one's business.
Quick side note: in the audience were Stephen Schwartz, Jimmy Smits, and Allison Janney (in the front row, otherwise I'm sure I could have gotten those seats).
I use my cell phone as my alarm clock. This has the added benefit of ensuring that I charge my phone pretty much every night. Dana recently said she was tired of the same old alarm noise in the morning, and I realized it was time to get a couple of new ringtones.
Several months ago I discovered, through Google and some trial and error, how to make a ringtone from an MP3 and transfer it to my phone (Motorola v600). The trickiest part, in my opinion, is editing the music to a short section that sounds natural when it repeats. I import the MP3 to Garageband, which converts it to AIFF, edit it there, then send it back to iTunes and have iTunes re-encode it to MP3, at a sample rate my phone will like. Then send it to the phone over Bluetooth, and it's done.
At the time I did this with music from Fantasmic, and loved the result. So last weekend I picked a few more, and I now have ringtones for the Overture from Candide, Doctor Who, Deep Space Nine, the Price is Right, and, probably my favorite, Linus & Lucy (the Peanuts theme).
I would post samples, but I'm pretty sure that would be breaking some copyright rules. I don't have a problem arguing that what I've done is fair use of music I own, but distribution would be different.
Anyway, it was a fun project. I'm overwhelmed, sometimes, with all the fun things one COULD do with music, photos, and movies (and iLife makes much of it easy), so it's nice to actually sit down and do a project like this.
Any of you unfamiliar with file extensions will likely still recognize common extensions like ".doc", ".xls", ".pdf", or even ".mp3" . Windows uses these extensions to determine a file's type, and thereby which application should be used to open it. Mac OS 9 didn't use file extensions at all; it kept type and application info in a small extra file 'attached' to a given file called a "resource fork". Mac OS X now uses a sort of hybrid system, which I confess I haven't ever fully investigated, but for the most part file extensions are the rule (though they are often hidden from the user's view).
I recently learned of the file extension matching my initials: ".kmz". It's being used for a saved workspace in Google Earth. These files are actually zipped containers of several smaller files. Google acquired the technology behind Google Earth from a company called Keyhole, so I'm guessing the file extension comes from something like "Keyhole Map Zipped".
All in all, I could think of many much less interesting file types to have my initials on.
Found an interesting, small little web application called LoanBack (found via O'Reilly Radar).
This site does one thing: it creates a custom promissory note for anyone who wants to lend/borrow money between friends or family. You answer a handful of questions, and a professional note is produced, complete with payment schedule.
I like finding sites that fill a specific need by doing one, straightforward thing. LoanBack has plans to add features, but I hope they keep the clean, simple process intact.
Link: LoanBack.
First, let me say that I've been keeping up on most (though not all) of the changes going into Internet Explorer 7 (set for release late this year, along with Windows Vista). All in all, I think the goals they've set and the work they've done are great. They're making a browser that is safer by default, they're adding anti-phising technology (I'm not too sure about this bit, but I'll leave that for another time), they're adding browsing features other modern browsers have had for a couple of years (tabbed browsing and integrated search box), and, best of all, they are making huge strides in standards compliance, especially in regards to CSS.
All that said, the screenshot of the toolbar area for the newest release looks pretty sloppy. The link below is to a post by Jonathan Rentzch. He's adding to some comments people have made on the IE Blog, and I tend to agree: that new interface is not terribly user friendly, nor is it 'easy on the eyes'. I especially like his last point: he's got images of the IE7 toolbar and the Safari toolbar, and he points out that the latter compresses better as an image file because it's got less noise.
This is still an early release, to be sure, and maybe the UI will get some improvement before actual release, possibly based on some feedback from the beta.
Since earlier I mentioned how much I was enjoying "Freakonomics", I figure I should give an update now that I've finished it.
As the authors explain, there isn't necessarily a theme to the topics discussed in this book. It's more about applying tools and ideas (data, incenitve, correlation vs. causation) to a variety of interesting questions (why did crime rates drop?, do real estate agents sell their own homes just as they help sell others?, does a baby's name influence the child's success in school?).
All in all, I really enjoyed this book. I listened to the unabridged audiobook version, so a couple lists and tables were read aloud that probably would have looked a little nicer on a page, but it was easy to follow. Now and then I found an assumption to be oversimplified, or less than unshakable. All in all it's great to see data and what should be common sense used explain trends and answer questions contrary to conventional wisdom.
Steven Levitt's name is popping up with more and more frequency, unless I only seem to be seeing it more and more now that I'm aware of it. The book's website has some excerpts and articles and a blog from the authors, if you'd like a taste.
While in SF recently, I stayed with friends who had just moved up there, and they turned me on to a Playstation game called 'Guitar Hero'.
If you've ever caught yourself playing a bit of air guitar, you would have fun with this game. The game controller is a plastic guitar shaped controller which you hang from your neck by its strap. You have 5 'fret' keys by your left hand (assuming you are right handed), and 1 'strum' key for your right hand. The game has some great songs; while a song plays, your job is to watch the 'notes' come toward you, and, in rhythm, strum the guitar while holding down the correct combination of fret keys.
It's not as complicated as a real guitar, of course. But it's fun, and you get the same fun feeling that causes people everywhere to play the occasional air guitar. And there's more than I've gone into here: the guitar does have a whammy bar, and you can rock out extra hard by tilting the guitar up vertically.
It's silly fun, but isn't that all you can really ask for?
Link: 'Guitar Hero' on metacritic.com (where it has a 92 out of 100)
American Scientist has a great article on the mathematics of Sudoku. The author, Brian Hayes, first gives a brief history tracing the origins of Sudoku and its spread across the world. One interesting tidbit: many Japanese know the puzzle better by its original English name, "Puzzle Place", while most enthusiasts in the US and UK know it better by its Japanese name, "Sudoku".
Hayes also discusses the number of possible distinct solutions (3,546,146,300,288, or 4×10^12, once you've accounted for a number of symmetries), the minimum number of 'givens' required to solve a puzzle, and the relative strengths and weaknesses of solving methods a computer might use.
I feel I should report on my experience attending the MacWorld Expo keynote. I will try to resist a long commentary on the new announcements from Apple (iLife '06, Intel iMac, MacBook Pro), but I will include a few comments.
Going to the keynote at MacWorld is quite something. I arrived in the line outside Moscone center at around 4:45 am. There were maybe 100-150 people ahead of me (I'm not great at estimating crowd sizes). I enjoy the conversations that can be overheard in this line. People talking about previous MacWorlds, favorite Apple hardware (and least favorite), favorite websites, favorite tech gadgets (iPods, and others).
Just after 6:00 am, the line is easily several hundred people long. At that time we're let inside, where those with priority seating are sent to one area to wait, and the rest of us are sent to a large holding area, where we take a seat. In this area, laptops and iPods all come out of their cases. Nowhere else have I seen so many Apple products in use at once. Around 8:30 am, the excitement level picks up, and folks begin standing up and putting away their laptops. And at 8:55 am, we were sent down the hall and up the two sets of escalators to the keynote hall. This part is not unlike a stampede. I'd be surprised if no one was hurt.
Let me describe the keynote hall situation. The ballroom is large. Not stadium concert large, but convention center large. The front 25-35% is for Apple Employees and other VIPs. They and the press are seated first. (Al Gore, who is on Apple's Board of Directors, was in the front couple of rows.) Then those with priority seating are let in. By 8:55 am, when the stampede I was in arrived, the back 25% was largely empty, and the density increased going forward. I was able to get about halfway back (single open seats were easier to find). I was just behind one of the big screens showing those in the way back what was going on. It was handy for me to watch that screen during demos, and then the live stage for the rest.
The crowd was impressed with some Apple financial updates, but the collective 'ooh's, 'aah's, and other mumblings really came during the iLife '06 demos. I swear I heard multiple mutterances of "I could have used that for such and such I did last month for the holidays."
The crowd was also very happy to hear that Intel macs were ready early, though the rumors were so prevalent that I can't believe too many attendees were surprised. Still, I think the crowd, used to Apple being an afterthought of chip suppliers, was happy to see the Intel exec make an appearance.
Coming out of the keynote, it's impressive to see the Apple ads up on bus stops around town. They must choreograph those to within an hour or so. Lots of people crowd straight into the exhibit hall to get to the new toys right away. Others, like me, are tired after a long morning, and take a breather before heading towards the exhibit hall. Eating lunch helps.
That's my story. It's fun; geek fun, to be sure, but fun.
While driving to SF for Macworld, I began listening to an audiobook called Freakonomics, by Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner, and I'm really enjoying it.
I suppose I should finish a book before recommending it, but this has already been so enjoyable that I have to give it a plug. It's pretty popular; there's a good chance you seen it or heard of it. If you haven't, this is a book written by an economist and a journalist. It's not a course in micro-economics or anything; it seeks to answer interesting questions ("is there corruption in sumo wrestling?") by considering things like human incentives and distribution of information. There's really no math; any results arrived at by math are explained in a very understandable manner.