Well, it’s happened again. I should have seen it coming, the signs were all there, but I hoped “Not this time, it’s different.” However here I sit with what is most likely strep throat, judging from my track record and the terrible pain every time I swallow. This was not entirely unexpected, as every year for the past five or so I have contracted some alphabet letter of strep combined with something else, the worst being last year when I actually ended up in the hospital, on Valentine’s day. This year has been my healthiest ever though, and I’ve hardly gotten a cold or a sniffle for almost a year, so I was hoping this wouldn’t happen. That said, the timing could have been worse; I’m glad it wasn’t at SxSW (like poor Jane or Ernie); I’m glad it wasn’t on Valentine’s day; I’m glad it wasn’t during an “important” school week; I’m glad that you’re still reading at this point. I’m going to try and get some more rest. Updates will either be light, or come at a Kathyesque rate—we’ll see.
Vinyl CDs
I just grabbed a ten-pack of those vinyl recordable CDs and I now have a burning desire to put everything I have on them. Pun intended.
Gallery: 3-18-2003
Auto-imported from old gallery:
Piece of Cake
The mid-term on ethics was actually pretty easy, and the extra day or two of reading certainly didn’t hurt at all. It is really one of my favorite classes right now, and the professor has a really interesting British accent that seems to keep me quite interested in what he’s saying, or maybe I’m just dreaming. Of course living in Houston I should have a cinch on ethics, since our corporate community has it in bounds.
Over the past 3 hours I have caught up on more email than I thought possible. My inbox no longer runneth over. I have a strangely satisfied feeling that feels like I’ve done something, because email is not just a set of communication, but my inboxes (I have one address for business and one for pleasure) represent a set of things to do, of items screaming for attention in their unassuming way.
This was all done in what I believe to be the most perfect coffee house I have encountered so far: Outlets and ethernet ports every 4 feet and wireless so you don’t need to plug in, a friend who works there, very reasonable prices, good music, and some of the best bread I have ever tasted in my life. Well Sarah’s done with work now so I’m off.
For those that were asking, it’s called Kraftsmen and is at 4100 Montrose, 77006. It’s the place with the giant chessboard and the British telephone booth. Put another way, it’s inbetween the Black Lab and Cezanne’s and the Montrose Public Library. I also found out that they validate parking so that’s a plus.
Mid-Term Tomorrow, Really
So after much ado my mid-term really, truly is tomorrow. There can be no further delays or misunderstandings, it’s just a fact. Truthfully I wish it was just over, as I have a lot of Houston schmoozing to catch up on. For now however I will try and immerse myself in the in the intricacies of moral philosophy.
In other news I went for a much-needed eye checkup today. One eye had hardly changed from my last checkup, but the other had jumped into the deep end of the pool of myopia. Within the week though I should have new lenses in my current glasses (I’m not crazy about my other pair). In geek terms, I’ll be going from 1024×768 to a crisp 1600×1200. Now if I could only increase my memory…
Nikolai Does SxSW
Nikolai seems to have a knack for novel designs, and his summary of SxSW 2003 is no exception.
New Lows?
I just took a job in exchange for pink chocolate chip cookies. Did anyone else miss the boom years? Just kidding of course, for Christine I would do it even for Macadamia nut.
Everyone’s Favorite Brit
Hot dang, Ian has a weblog. Worth visiting if just for the picture of Ian in a swank suit with a red clown nose on.
My Day in Photos
My day in photos: Alfred Hitchcock would cringe. Mmmm, texture. New do. I love the arrow. Flowers for my Mother’s birthday. Blue steel.
Not pictured: my mid-term being delayed until Saturday, birthday dinner, evil Starbucks, rude and ageist salespeople, how wonderful this day was despite the occasional annoyance, and my funny elated look from being happiness-hungover from SxSW.
T-Mobile Ripoff
Oh my goodness! I’ve had a pre-pay T-Mobile account because Starbuck’s are so ubiquitous, but when I tried to log in right now it said my account has expired, even though I know I’ve hardly used it. Not that big a deal though, I can just refill it, check my email, post, and go along my merry way. So I start the refill process, and it wants $50. WTF? Let’s take a look at each of their plans to see what a ripoff it is:
- Unlimited National — $29.99 a month. This looks like the best deal until you notice that it requires a 12-month contract, and has a $200 early termination fee. What a rip.
- Unlimited National — $39.99 a month. This actually is the best deal, which is sad because this is how much I pay for my cell phone. They need to have something cheaper.
- Prepay 300 — $50. This is the plan they wanted me to refill to. What a rip! Those three hundred minutes expire in 120 days if you don’t use them and the minimum session time is 10 minutes, so at most you could get on this thirty times before you’re out.
- Pay as you go — 10 cents a minute. Okay finally we have something reasonable here, right? I can pop in and out, probably using under a dollar worth of minutes. Plus if I did end up using 300 minutes it would still be cheaper than their stupid prepay plan. But wait, it looks like there is a 60 minute minimum per session, which means every time you log on you would be paying $6.
These plans are ridiculous, and I’m going to take my WiFi card elsewhere. Or maybe I’ll stop in and try some of their very reasonably priced coffee. I feel strange saying this, but McDonald’s has the right idea. I would be happy to get a meal and some WiFi, or pay a reasonable $3 for an hour of access. Plus I assume that cash is an option, which is a plus. Of course there are some very good independent coffee houses around which I frequent, but unfortunately none of them are convenient to my next appointment, so I’m stuck without access. I guess it’s time to go war-driving and find some good nodes in the Montrose area.
I’m not trying to say that the above plans are wrong for everyone, just that for my planned usage of quick, infrequent stops here and there is no plan which I won’t pay out the nose for. I have come to the conclusion that T-Mobile is the devil though. Now I’m just going to head to my haircut, and then to the long-anticipated mid-term.
Gallery: 3-13-2003
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Future of Email
A group I’m a part of is preparing to form a number of “working groups” and each group may prepare a number of documents. The proposed format for these documents is plain ASCII text wrapped at 74 characters. It’s not the IETF, and on the whole it seemed like a rather restrictive format to develop documents in, an opinion which I’ve been trying my best to communicate. The discussion is still ongoing, but there was a brief tangent where several people misconstrued my argument as being one for HTML email, which is a totally separate beast.
Anyway it got me thinking about how HTML email is almost universally condemned among tech-savvy email groups. The problem, I think, is not technological but in fact human. HTML email has the potential to be clean, structured markup that can add a number of rich elements that there is no standard way to add in plain ASCII, such as emphasis, links, quotes, and in general represent things in a more meaningful way. The problem is generally not in the receiving client; I can’t think of a client with no HTML reading support (even Pine does some). Also the MIME standard allows and encourages a plain text equivalent of all rich content. It’s a problem, to put it into Spiderman terms, of great power and great responsibility. Someone very near and dear to my heart sends me email with garish background, text that varies between large and red or some purple script font, and any number of images speckled about. To me an ideal solution would be an email composer that enforced strict separation of style and content, and a client which allowed any CSS attributes to be toggled at will. Someday, perhaps?
Last Pictures
I just added the last of my SxSW pictures. As many of you know Monday was my last day, so I don’t have any from Tuesday. Also for those that asked it actually turned out the Ethics mid-term wasn’t today, but is on Thursday, which was actually a big relief. Coming back I was utterly exhausted—physically, emontionally, and intellectually—and I crashed for about 6 hours in a very satisfying nap. There’s no bed like home.
Menu Revamped
Okay, per Tantek’s suggestion I’ve made the menu entirely a nested list, and adjusted the CSS accordingly. I had to work out a few kinks with the specificity of the contextual selectors, but after that it was a breeze. However this has brought to my attention how terribly ugly the CSS ridge effect is in Mozilla—really unattractive. It’s a shame because a lot of people seem to like it, but I’m exploring other options. Structure is groovy. Hell is a world without the style attribute.
What If
What if there was a gathering of the leaders, speakers, visionaries, teachers, mentors, and founders of the web? What if there was non-stop, extensive discussion of the pressing issues of web development and practice? What if this meeting of peers had the nicest people you will ever meet, every one of them so friendly and accessible that it makes you appreciate humankind? What if you were given the opportunity to meet with the very people who shaped your education and development in your most formative years? What if this magical event ended too soon?
I wanted to say goodbye, at least for now, to all of the wonderful people I met at South by Southwest Interactive this year. I feel really privileged.
Update: Doug Bowman has some similar thoughts.
Dreamweaver SSH Tunneling
Did you know Dreamweaver can tunnel its connection over SSH using Putty? Neither did I. I haven’t quite gotten it to work yet, but I’m pretty excited about it. I’m just thinking about it because all of the unencrypted traffic flowing over the free wireless here at SxSW. Someone with a simple sniffer could cause a lot of trouble. Encrypt whenever you can! You can even browse PhotoMatt over SSL.
Notes: The Future: User-Centered Design Goes Mainstream
These are a day late and a little short but I thought I should put them up anyway.
- Katharine Parrish
- Heather
Champ - Jason Nolan
- Ana Sisnett
Parrish: Strong claims: power, justice, and change. Aim to strengthen and not quash these principles. Limiting concerns to blogs. Many questions regarding accessibility. Blog tool developers have made many efforts to keep their tools flexible. Celebrate those efforts and use it as a starting point. Other barriers to access: technical, socio-economic, political. If all barriers were gone, would anyone publish anything. Continue reading Notes: The Future: User-Centered Design Goes Mainstream
Newest Pictures
The latest pictures have some random shots throughout the day, some of the Bloggies, and a few blurry ones from Fray Café. Enjoy! I’m just skipping lunch and trying to catch up with things.
Notes: Surviving Your Own Collaborative Project
Micheal: K10K began with our dissatisfaction with the other sites out there, they didn’t update enough…
Heather: I realized that photographers have been taking pictures of themselves in reflective surfaces for a long time. Originally called “Jezebel’s Mirror”. Starting working with Aaron Cope (?) to do all of the back-end. Started very slow, but then grew to 700 and that’s when they moved to the back-end. Continue reading Notes: Surviving Your Own Collaborative Project
Thoughts from An Old Hand
I was sitting next to Derek when he wrote this. Some interesting thoughts, and I’m as guilty as any of being weblog-centric in my thinking. I think WiFi, which I’m involved in through the Houston Wireless group, and weblogs, which you are experiencing now. I see a tremendous potential for enfranchisement, which I’m not even sure if that’s a word but it’s the best suited I can think of. My confession: I used to hate the word ‘weblog’, ‘blog’, and every variant thereof. At one point I spent hours scouring this site for every mention of it and removing on sight. I’ve gotten over myself.