Photographer, Boatbuilder, IT Guru, Writer, Musician, Therapist, Masseur, Firearms Enthusiast (in other words, a Generalist)
With the caveat being, I wasn’t spending a lot of time or energy shooting. This was a relaxing and fun vacation.
First, a surfer from the ESA eastern surfing championships:
Wenona feeding a seagull from her hand on the back of the Ocracoke ferry…
The Hatteras lighthouse…
Lightning over the ocean…
and all six kids DSing together…
I did my normal run this morning, still improving my pace but still not race-ready yet. This is really a tangent — I wore my 2005 Race for the Cure tshirt for my run this morning. When I put it on, I thought, this is appropriate for working out in. While I was on the trail, I had to laugh. To others seeing me running in it, it might say, “This guy ran in the 2005 Race for the Cure, he’s kind of out of shape now, maybe he’s just getting back into running.” In reality, I participate in 2005 with people from my then-current place of employment. Since it was in DC, I stayed at Jeff’s apartment the night before instead of coming up in the morning. Jeff and I had quite a bit of scotch that night. Now that I think of it, that must have been the night Saul met us at Joe Theismann’s earlier in the evening. So the mental image others get by seeing a race shirt, one of a confident athletic guy running a race, is quite different than the reality, two guys so hungover from the previous night’s scotch that it was a chore to complete the 10K even at a walking pace. But hey, at least I got a couple of t-shirts out of it.
I finished Digital Fortress (audiobook), and started listening to Snow Crash this week. I am flipping back and forth periodically between Snow Crash, written by Neal Stephenson (who also wrote Cryptonomicon) and learning Spanish, por que es importante para mi.
Someone at work heard of my interest in Cryptonomicon, and recommended that I check out Digital Fortress, a Dan Brown (I know…) novel (fiction of course) about the NSA, and an “unbreakable” code. It’s an interesting book so far, but it’s a bit frustrating to experience technical details that are incorrect or grossly misleading. I hate when writers do that. There’s so little good crypto fiction out there that what’s out there should be vetted by someone in the business prior to publication. Bits vs bytes, bad buzzwords, and even worse, terrible character names. I mean, come on, “Trevor Strathmore?”
So driving home yesterday, I noticed a HAMMER in the road in the oncoming lane. I did NOT pull over, dash across busy lanes of traffic and pick it up. I kept driving, along with the other hundreds of folks in traffic with me. I wonder how many of them were visualizing the potential disaster which awaited some innocent fellow traveler… a big truck runs over the hammer just right, sending it flying through the windshield of an oncoming car and killing its occupant.
So the other day, Sunday morning I think it was, I woke from a dream in which my wife was asking me, “Who is iang?” She was pronouncing it as a word, but in my mind I saw it spelled that way. I take dreams as hints, so I immediately cracked open the laptop (what? we don’t ALL sleep with a laptop within reach?) and opened a Google window, typing in iang. Imagine my surprise when the second entry is directly relevant to recent experience and reading:
iang.org
Blog on Financial Cryptography · Free Banking Page · Papers · European Digital Money · Rants · Crypto Fiction Reviews · SSL Considered Harmful …
iang.org/ - 2k - Cached - Similar pages
Unsolved and Solved Ciphers
Elonka maintains a list of well-known unsolved codes and ciphers. A couple of the better-known unsolved ancient historical scripts are also thrown in, since they tend to come up during any discussion of unsolved codes.
Elonka’s list includes a mention of the fascinating Voynich Manuscript, an old unsolved illustrated manuscript. Voynich is very similar to the Codex Seraphinianus in that it is also illustrated and unsolved. I actually own a copy of the Codex. I found it interesting that Elonka doesn’t mention the Codex, and emailed to mention that fact. No response yet.
I bought a copy of Cryptonomicon. As an IT professional working in the security field, it seemed to fall right into place as the next book to read. It was originally recommended by Mike Terry, who seems to be a big Neal Stephenson fan. I was liking the book, but having limited time to read it now that I’m no longer commuting by train, I picked up the AudioBook of it.
Now I’m simultaneously gratified and annoyed. Sure, I can listen to it during my commute, and that works out well, especially with the Prius’ integrated audio and navigation system. When I get a call from my wife during the commute, the bluetooth-integrated system intercepts the call, PAUSES the CD while I take the call, and then resumes when I hang up. But I’m finding there are things I don’t like about audiobooks, especially for large books such as Cryptonomicon. Namely, the abridgements. I had left off reading the book shortly after a particularly satisfying brawl scene in a sushi bar, which had elements of comedy and adventure that I found fulfilling. This entire scene is left out of the audiobook and only referred to vaguely when describing the other character as having been met in a bar fight.
Yesterday was a busy day around the house. Aside from the critically important tasks, which included researching ways to update the maps in our new used Prius’ navigation system without paying $250-$300 to the dealer for the newest update, I attacked a number of things on the honeydew list.
I planted tomatoes and peppers.
I mulched the Japanese maples in the yard.
I weeded the lilac and butterfly bushes.
I refinished the surface of the dining room table.
I put grass seed down in the front yard.
Oh yes, I forgot to mention, the next-door neighbors who were renting to own moved out. I said it from the beginning, renting to own never works. It’s always structured in an unbalanced way in favor of the landlord/seller.
Today I just kind of sat around trying to nap. Watched Fight Club, had a beer, etc.
And yes, we bought a Prius the other night. My commute is 55-60 miles, and now we’re spending a lot less in gas to get me to and fro.
I had a good day today.
Section 1: 100%
Section 2: 93% on RHCT requirements, and 89% on the RHCE requirements.
But today, I RockBoxed my Ipod.
Yes, you read that right.
I got tired of the limited amount of information displayed in the Ipod screen while music is playing. I started Googling. “How can I display the year on my Ipod screen?” Well, the answer, saving you the pain of searching, is that you can’t, using Apple’s Ipod firmware. You can’t customize JACK about the Ipod using Apple’s firmware.
“So,” in the words of the great Tim Allen, “I rewired it.” Rockbox is an open-source music browser which has been ported to numerous players, including most of the Ipods. It allows for customizable themes which let you put ALL SORTS of information into what they call the WPS (While Playing Screen). Including the year. It’s kinda cool. You can also customize the background, which I started to do but haven’t completed yet.
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