Hi, folks!

I have a fair amount of records which I enjoy hauling out and playing once in a while.

Here’s the vinyl I’ve been listening to lately.

“NOTHING”

At this juncture in my life, I don’t have a goddamned turntable. What with three kids under five running about, I don’t necessarily want a turntable.

But now that I mention it, you know who has a turntable, and who has lately been spinning a variety of platters at his abode, reporting on his listening experiences?

Tim, that’s who!

Tim, keep on spinning, playing and say-hey-heying!

Since my Green Monkey Music Project has come to a regrettable end, I’m hoping to find a new project to embark upon.

Here’s a few I have been bandying about. Please let me know if you are interested in any.

01. Orange Spider Prescription Drug Project
02. Supervirus By Bike Messenger Project
03. Tomato In A Stranger’s Face Project
04. Let’s All Wear Unlaced Nikes And Catch A Ride On A Comet Project
05. Project X Starring Matthew Broderick
06. Hippy-Baiting
07. The Hiding Marbles Project
08. Smurfs Fanfiction
09. The Animal Boobs Project
10. The Ponzi Project

I saw a half-gnawed pumpkin on my walk to the train today, which of course made me think of the 1993 album Siamese Dream.

Billy Corgan recently revived his old group Smashing Pumpkins for a new album. I thought it might be nice to give the band a new name, as it represents a different lineup from the earlier Pumpkins incarnation.

Here are some suggestions. You can take them or leave them.

01 Smooshing Pumpkins
02 Squeezing Pimples
03 Pickled Beets
04 Tickling Squash
05 Fisting Watermelons
06 Counting Crows
07 Billy Corgan’s Ennui Featuring Jimmy Chamberlin On Drums
08 Weeping Thunder
09 Baldy
10 After-Zwan

Oh, and I still want my audition tape back.

It’s not official, but Bubs (or the timing chip in his shoe) just passed the finish line in the 2007 LaSalle Chicago Marathon.

05:08:31 (net) @ Finish (unofficial). Pace 11:46. By The LaSalle Bank Chicago Marathon

Congratulations, Bubs (or Bubs’ shoe)!

Doctor Monkey Von Monkerstein has been of late posting some very lovely cooking posts.

I’ve been a l’il inspired by him, as I so often am.

I’d like to share a little recipe that I made up all by myself when I was a youngun. I haven’t actually made this dish (if you can call it that) in probably twenty-five years or more.

Those of you with young children might want to teach this trick to them. Hey, forget the kids, this is a treat for children of all ages.

Warning: This post contains potentially disgusting pictures. I assure you that nothing unsavory was done in the making of this post. And the ingredients only consist of M&M’s and water.

You will need: M&M’s and a paper cup full of water

Pour the M&M’s into the water.

Wait.

At a certain point, the water gets saturated with M&M detritus, so you must empty the water out and refill with fresh stuff. My wife grudgingly looked at these pictures shortly before I uploaded them. She asked me, “What do you do with the water?” I replied, “You drink it, of course.”

Immediately after refilling the cup with water, it turned this murky green color.

Empty the water again, to reveal the delicious milk chocolate remaining.

Bon Appetit!

I took my camera to work yesterday, with the half-assed idea I’d take pictures at the Chicago Cubs game I was going to later that night (they lost!).

I ended up just leaving my camera in the car, so I have no lovely photos of their loss or my drinking of much beer.

I *did* take some pictures of my work area earlier in the day. Several people have privately urged me to share photos of my workplace. Okay, no one has actually done this. But here they are!

First something to grab your attention!

If I turn around from my ‘puter, this is what I see. A guy on my team recently retired, and I moved into his “cube” with the spectacular view. I like me a starin’ window.

Old Man Programmer didn’t just leave me with the view. He also left me with this crazy-assed plant that I almost killed (plants need water, apparently).

I have a reasonably-sized section of wall dedicated to all things artistic:

On the wall I have some pics from the kiddies, as well as my previously mentioned yellowed clipping of a post-pretzel-choking Dubya.

Just below him are my cherished foreign monkey (well, chimpanzee, actually) postcards. If you ask really nicely, I’ll scan them so you can see them in their “hilarious” glory.

My bookcase (partial view)

Here’s some books I rarely look at, along with some various doodads.

Doodads
The red buddha on the left was given to me by a coworker coming back from a trip to China. The Beast and Hulk action figures were presents given to my superhero-lovin’ daughter. They turned out to be die cast, and really heavy, so I, being the anxious daddy that I am, took them to work. The snowglobe I got in Rome. It’s gradually losing water, I think probably just due to evaporation. Nestled behind the globe is Duke, the completely unnecessary and slightly disturbing mascot of Java. If you look at the bottom left of the picture, you can just make out the plastic wrestler dude that sits atop my PC, guarding it with fists raised. Lastly, I can’t remember where that lion toy came from. It’s a bonafide mystery.

Books
A lot of the books I got for free. Some I got at the various JavaOne conferences I have attended. My brother used to work for a publishing company, and he would be able to get some free programming books as well, which he’d give to me. That Idiot’s Guide To Linux is one of them. On principle, I would never spend money on a book that insults my intelligence in its title.

My favorite book out of these is Joshua Bloch’s Effective Java:

I saw Bloch give a lecture at JavaOne, basically taking samples out of his book. I liked the lecture so much I bought it.

His next book was done with Neal Gafter, called Java Puzzlers:

I didn’t like Java Puzzlers so much. It felt more like a “I know squirrelly things about Java that you don’t know, and would never be able to figure out” book. But, I did get them to autograph the book for me when I was at my last JavaOne:

I had specifically asked one of them to write “Keep On Rockin'” and the other to write “Keep On Rollin'”. I thought it was funny. They didn’t seem to think so, but obliged me.

They no longer work for Sun Microsystems — they’re bigshots at Google now. May they rock and roll and understand my sense of humor far into the future!

I’ve mentioned before that I spent some time down in St. Bernard’s Parish, gutting houses as a volunteer through Habitat For Humanity.

Bubs drove, and some relatives of MizBubs and myself went along for the ride.

When we got down there we joined up with other people to form “TeamBlack14”, whose mission was to gut houses in the parish. Unlike the 9th ward, which suffered the full brunt of the levee breach caused by Hurricane Katrina, many houses in St. Bernard’s Parish were still structurally sound, and could be safely rebuilt.

However, everything *in* the houses was ruined. Our group’s task was to gut houses there, hauling out all the furniture, appliances, carpeting, drywall, you name it. If something wasn’t too damaged, we would set it aside in a pile for the homeowner. The amount we could save from an entire house would usually fit into a two foot square area.

In the several houses we were able to clean out over the course of a week, we met either the homeowner, or a close relative of the homeowner. They were all very kind, and good-natured, and really appreciated people helping them out.

The group was an interesting mix. Besides us, there was a retired couple from Brooklyn, who were in the midst of a cross-country road trip across the United States, devoting a week of their trip to volunteering. There was a lawyer from Brentwood, California, accompanied by her teenage son. There was a student from Stanford University on his spring break. And there was a carpenter from my hometown, Springfield, Illinois.

It was a really powerful experience being down there, being a part of something positive, and it’s something I would really like to do again.

When I got back, I was really motivated to get people at my workplace involved in volunteering, but, as it so often happens with me, my good intentions don’t translate into action.

So, over a year later, I’ll try.

There is still plenty of work to be done in the New Orleans area, and Habitat For Humanity is still looking for volunteers.

I am planning on going down again the week of December 17th (the work week would cover Dec. 17 – Dec. 21). I thought I would ask people that read this to consider volunteering as well. I can do my best to answer any questions you have.

I’m not sure of all the logistics at this point, but I believe if we get enough people together going down the same week, we can all work together as a group in whatever capacity we are needed.

Here are some pics from last year’s effort:

TeamBlack14 (minus Bubs, who took the pic). Homeowner is second from left.

The same house, with its trash heaps we hauled out of the house

Bubs in front of another trash heap

TeamBlack14!

More information

New Orleans area Habitat For Humanity website

Construction Calendar for all the New Orleans Habitat for Humanity projects

UPDATE
If you’d rather not comment, but would like to discuss the project a bit more with me, tentatively discuss the possibilities of volunteering, etc., you can always email me. Thanks.

Also, it’s not obvious from my initial posting, but it’s not all twenty-four hour work. Every night after we put in a hard day’s gutting we went into town and had alcoholic beverages and deep-fried food. Mmmmm, fried pickles…

You know what I think when I see a kid roll past me wearing those shoes with wheels in a supermarket, on a sidewalk, etc.?

That is one f*cking cool kid.

Frank Sirmarco and SamuraiFrog have tied for first place in the Gayest Video Ever ™ contest!

It is my great honor to present each of them with The Schneider!

To collect your prize, please right-click on the image below and select “Save Image As…”.

Congratulations to you both!

In the future, there may be discussions on the web and beyond as to the gayness of this video or that video, but the fourteen people who voted over these last two days spoke for the entire Internet. Nay, they spoke for the world.

This is *the* defining moment of gay video discussion. You voters are a part of history now, and will be enshrined forever in Wikipedia (at least until they block my IP address from making edits).

I’d like to thank everyone for participating, and humbly offer a Meaningless Cherry Award to each and every one of you as a token of my appreciation.