WTF? (“What the frak?”)

Saw the final episode. Interesting. A few really cool moments… although the big setpiece battle felt a little rushed, and a case, like Return of the King (something already mentioned on DBA) of the denoument being broken up into too many pieces. I didn’t mind for RoTK, given the source material and what they had to resolve, but for this one they spent a lot of time on things that weren’t that satisfying. The last “twist” was predictable, but the execution of it was surprisingly funny despite it.

All told? Good stuff and a relatively good ending to the series, but without the rewatchability of the first four seasons of Babylon 5.

Pictures of the new house!

Loan funded yesterday, and purchase closed today. We’re officially homeowners, and as such I can now share pictures of our new house.

Our New House

My weird dietary habits

Things I don’t eat
1) Mushrooms or other “edible” fungi. Things that are that closely related to the gunk that grows on your feet are not food! (Yeast, used as a leavening or fermenting agent is fine. Marmite is probably out.)

2) Shellfish, worms, bugs, or other invertebrates. “Ewww, bugs!”

3) Most condiments
3a) Mayo or miracle whip is right out on anything.
3b) Non-honey mustard
3c) Most salad dressings. (Ranch or honey mustard is OK, as long as it’s not too thick and not mayo-based.)

4) Organ meats

5) Heads/claws/feet/hooves – and leaving those attached to otherwise yummy things makes them inedible until rectified.

6) Cuts where the bone-to-meat ratio is too high (ie, chicken wings, although good ribs are just low enough to qualify as food.)

7) Salmon, unless smoked.
7a) Any other fish, if prepared in a manner which leaves it “mushy.”

8 ) Sweet American cheese on a hamburger, unless it’s from a fast food place.

9) Diet sodas, except for Coke Zero.

10) Weird vegetables: artichokes, coliflower, eggplant, squash, pumpkin or anything else weird/gross looking or squash-like

11) Red onions.
11a) Other onions, if raw. (Raw non-red onions are OK on sandwiches and good on burgers, but are to be left on briefly for flavor and then removed before eating.)

12) Most non-wheat (whether whole or white) breads
12a) Regular “American” squishy loaves are really only good for toast or grilled cheese, too
12b) French-style loaves shouldn’t be squishy
12c) Whole-wheat bread shouldn’t taste sweetened.

13) Anything stir-fried

14) Coffee, or anything coffee flavored.

15) Anything except tea in hot black/green tea (although toasted rice is “tea” if it’s genmaicha)
15a) No sugar in iced tea unless there is a LOT of lemon, or it’s a sweetened milk tea
16b) No milk in tea except for the sweetened milk tea, ie from a boba place

16) Unsweatened “flavored” waters

17) Grapefruit or pomelo.

18) Un-pitted peaches, apricots or plums (although all three are yummy if pitted or if I’ve got a knife handy to do it myself.)

19) Solid tofu, or any tofu-based faux-meat. (Tofu or soy in things that are not faux-meat are fine if I can’t tell it’s there.)

(Previously posted on flyertalk OMNI, originally on Jun 18, 08; for those OMNI qualified, look for the “Your personal food rules” thread, which is particularly funny.)

An eventful weekend.

1) As of Friday, I was accepted for readmission at UC Santa Cruz, and will be going back to retake Algorithms and finish my MS this spring. W00t.

2) As of Saturday, we are officially under contract on a house. It’s here in San Mateo, really near work. Pictures are available but will not be posted here until we close, which will be on like March 2nd or something like that. Keep your fingers crossed that nothing gets screwed up on the financing.

On the down side, I was sick as a dog with a cold all weekend.

Meta-phishing.

Here’s a phishing email I received:

Important:
You’re getting this letter in connection with new directions issued by U.S. Treasury Department. The directions concern U.S. Federal Wire online payments.

On January 26, 2009 a large-scaled phishing attack started and has been still lasting. A great number of banks and credit unions is affected by this attack and quantity of illegal wire transfers has reached an extremely high level.

U.S. Treasury Department, Federal Reserve and Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) in common worked out a complex of immediate actions for the highest possible reduction of fraudulent operations. We regret to inform you that definite restrictions will be applied to all Federal Wire transfers from February 6 till February 13.

Here you can get more detailed information regarding the affected banks and U.S. Treasury Department restrictions:
(URL Redacted, for obvious reasons)

Yes, it’s a phishing email pretending to be a warning about phishing. Good grief!

XKCD gets it.

Genetic Algorithms

Hello Skynet!

I gotta travel soon.

It’s been a while since the dollar has been this strong in places I’d like to visit (or visit again), which is weird given the economy, but whatever.

US$1.4 = 1 UK pound (just better, actually!)
US$1 = nearly 35 baht
US$1 = nearly 3.5 Argentine pesos

The Canadian and Australian dollars, and the Euro are fairly strong, and the Japanese yen is crazy strong – only like 89 to US$1 – so I’m glad I went there when I did. But yeah, it’s definitely time for another outside-the-US vacation/mileage run, and I hope the dollar will still be this strong in March or whenever I can actually take one.

It’s done.

Congratulations to our new President, and good riddance to Shrubbo.

What the frak?

Saw the first episode of BSG Season 4.5. Raised more questions than it answered. Quite a downer. Gah.

Yet another blogmeme quiz

I don’t think I’m enough of a music geek to get this, but it’s an amusing quiz:

Your result for What’s your key signature?…

C# Minor

C Sharp. C sharp run. You’d only know I was reusing this joke from C# Major’s headline if you cheated.

Continue reading “Yet another blogmeme quiz”

Good housing crisis article.

via Flyertalk: A housing crusade that went awry

Today, administration officials say it is fair to ask whether Bush’s ownership push backfired. Paulson said the administration, like others before it, “over-incented housing.”

Keith B. Hennessey, Bush’s current chief economics adviser, put it this way: “I would not say too much emphasis on expanding homeownership. I would say not enough early focus on easy lending practices.”

Also, another good site to look at is the Doctor Housing Bubble/ blog.

Discovery of the day.

McDonalds’ Bacon Ranch Salad, which I’m occasionally eaten over the last couple of years, is just as good without dressing – the bacon and cheese basically work as dressing.

In fact, the amount of bacon and cheese on it may be a bit much without being masked by dressing, but it’s easy to pick around them when they get to be a bit much.