Stop the HighDef Madness

Ok, I am well aware that it is Xmas and the retailers are doing whatever they can to stir the feeding frenzy of consumerism that passes itself off as "Christmas giving." But the whole push to digital TV and HighDef schtuff has officially gone too fucking far with this: http://www.multichannel.com/article/CA6565742.html?nid=4262

South Park in High Def? The show is intentionally crappy animation with paper cuts-outs and stop-action animation. Man, get a 42" HD flat panel and you'll do ANYTHING to justify the "need" for it. Worse than crack.

But then, I'm just jealous.

Keep the teeth, Santa. I want trains and Legos.

So B lost his second tooth yesterday. He lost the first one about a week ago. So now he is missing his two front lower teeth. Seems like were all set up for some sort of Leave_It_To_Beaver era Christmas card photo. But B doesn't need to limit he wish list with Santa to just two front teeth; he has the adult teeth already halfway in.

Parenthood is such a funny drug - doing things such as making you proud of a ubiquitous biological process.

So what is the state of the Tooth Fairy economy, you ask? B wanted to keep his first tooth so we told him to leave a note for the T.F. and expect that the absence of a tooth would mean no payment. "She" (cuz all T.F's are female, right?) left him a dollar coin for getting the first tooth out by himself (no string tied to a door knob) and told him the next tooth would also get a discounted payment. For the second he rec'd a five spot. WTF! I think I got a quarter per tooth, on average. Man we parents of singles are spoilers. Shame on the Tooth Fairy.

DSD

The sticky state of sperm warfare

I remember many years ago a female friend told me that human ejaculate gets extra viscous upon release, and then 18 minutes later becomes more fluid. Stumbled across this and now I understand why she was right.

Code Charge Studio and helping hands for weary Web app developers.

So for the last two weeks I've been evaluating (aka trying to build something that works) a RAD tool for Web apps. Code Charge Studio 4 is a fine tool for rapidily spitting out pleasant looking Web sites for CRUD actions on database driven sites. It provides a very simple front-end for building the main structure of the app, but generates readily manipulatible code (I'm having it output C# ASP.NET but it also does PHP, Java, "classic" ASP). In between it provides a way to "reach through" the IDE tools and easily add custom code that won't get overwritten by the CCS code generator. That is about as much as I've gone behind the curtain, but I have found it much easier to learn for the fairly common features for a Web front-end for a database application than I have with MS Visual Studio. I suspect as I get more skilled with the CCS tool and C#/ASP.NET, I'll reach more often for the more advanced powers of VS2005/2008. But for now, CCS has helped me get some stuff off my to-do plate quicker than I could have with my current VS2005 skills AND it has helped me advance my C# skills from reverse engineering the code it outputs. Thumbs Up.

Andrew Lahde - So long and thanks for all the $$$$

Well here is one person who seems to have ethically made his millions in the recent sub-prime boom and bust. I wish I could meet this guy and say thank you for this goodbye letter.

No Obama/Biden gushing here...

Though my family is elated that THEIR candidates walked away with the election. I myself am once again scratching my head regarding the electoral college. I tend to be biased towards the founding fathers when the issue is debatable (e.g. the age requirements for President, US Senator) and idealistically libertarian when it isn't (e.g. slavery is NOT tolerable - period). With the popular vote for President much closer than the electoral college results - O=53% of the votes cast for O or M, and M = 47%, but, 349 to 147 electoral votes (0=70%, M=30%) - it just seems strange. Not as bad as 2000 with the popular vote and electoral college at odds, though. Nonetheless, I admit to being discomforted by yet another apples to oranges oddity but I'll go with the founding fathers' design...for now. Oh, and let's not forget the "third-party" candidates' votes. E.g. My candidate - Bob Barr with maybe 0.4% of the popular vote.