... right round, like a record, baby.

Our turntable is finally working. I got the pre-amp and needle in the mail this week. The only thing left to do is provide proper grounding to eliminate the very annoying hum. I've got the wire, I just need to go home and hook it up.

The 21,529,464th, and final, Volkswagen Beetle (the original) rolled of the assembly line today in Puebla, Mexico. The New York Times (free registration req.) has the story.

I've been trying to get Imagemagick installed on my computer for a while now. First, I tried just using the binaries, but that didn't work. Then I tried to use Fink, but that didn't work either. However, I found out that it didn't work because I hadn't installed the Developer Tools yet. Now I'm trying Fink again, and it's working quite nicely now that the DevTools are installed. Hopefully the Imagemagick install will work as well.

Finally Blogger has gotten with the program and made it's BlogThis! feature compatible with browsers other than IE. Expect more blogging in the future.

This link comes via What Do I know: live-action bullet-time ping pong.

From: ****@mail.house.gov

I've never gotten mail from a .gov address before.

I got my turntable today! I got a notice from UPS on friday that I missed the delivery guy, but waited at home today so I would be sure to be here when he showed up again. I opened the box and pulled out just enough of the packing peanuts so that I could get the turntable out without spilling the beans (the styrofoam ones). The first thing I noticed was that the platter was sitting on top of the tone arm... not where it should have been, but where it ended up after travelling from Colorado via Kentucky. I opened the dust cover and put everything back in order. Looking at the needle confirmed my fears: It was bent and would probably need replacing.

Then, I checked out the back to uncoil the power audio cords, only to find that there were no audio cords. That's not too big of a deal either, an RCA cord will only be a couple of dollars. The minor problem is that there's no grounding wire included, so I'll need to pick up one of those too. The Radio Shack down the street will likely have one so I'm not too worried about that.

So, once I get the pre-amp that I ordered, and then get RCA and grounding cords, and a new needle, and find some shelf space, I'll finally be able to listen to some vinyl.

My turntable is sitting in the UPS warehouse for the weekend. It doesn't matter too much, though, because I need a pre-amp for it. I went to a several places in town and no one had one in stock, nor would they order one. I just finished ordering one online that will do the trick and hope it gets here soon.

Apple has released Soundtrack as a stand-alone application (it used to be only bundled with FCP). I hadn't seen it until today, but it looks really cool. Now I just need an external firewire hard drive that's faster than my internal, and Final Cut Pro, of course. I can't even explain why, but for some reason this application has me really excited.

Oh yes, It will be mine.

Watched the latest Terminator movie today. It's packed full of guns, explosions and robots. Light on dialogue. I really enjoyed myself throughout the movie. Until the last two minutes. The only thing they could do to make it more obvious that there will be a sequel is put "To be continued..." just before the credit reel. I really dislike how every movie lately seems to be setting up for a sequel. Other than that problem, which is a very minor problem for the movie (but a major problem with Hollywood), it's very good.

The WiFi Finder makes finding WiFi access points easy -- it will when it's released anyway.

People still design for 640x480 screens even though most monitors now support higher resolutions. It's still a good idea, because not everyone browses the web at full-screen. However, nearly all monitors support more than 256 colors and, given the choice, most people choose to browse the web with thousands or millions of colors. With that in mind, there's little reason to stick to a 216-color web-safe pallette anymore, so More Crayons has a web-smart pallette that includes 4,096 colors and a neat web application to display them and give you the hex value for each one.

This may be the coolest thing I've ever seen: Audiopad. Watch the video and try to tell me you're not impressed.

I've read two books in less than a week. In fact, I read each of them in one day or less. The first book was Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. It wasn't my favorite of the Harry Potter books, mostly because Harry acted like Luke Skywalker in Episode IV: "But I was going to go to Taschi Station to pick up some power converters." Also, the climax just didn't really do it for me. Harry faces Voldemort -- again -- and Voldemort is thwarted -- again.

The other book was Nick Hornby's How to be Good. Hornby, who wrote About a Boy and High Fidelity, like Rowling, didn't really do it for me this time, either. It's a good story, and I might have liked it better if I hadn't yet read the other two, but as it is I'm stuck comparing it to them. Those certainly aren't ringing endorsements, but I still recommend both of them... I did finish each of them in less than a full day, after all, so they couldn't have been that bad.

"As you can see it also has a timecode, which is very difficult to fake."

"For the benefit of the court, can you please explain what a timecode is?"

"Just because I don't know, doesn't mean I'm lying!"

MiniDV has a timecode that records where on the tape you currently are. It's in the format MM:SS:FF. Apparently it also records the actual day and time the recording was made based on the camera's internal clock:

Ambrosia Software has released a new game: Uplink. It's mission-based, like Escape Velocity, but instead of flying around in space, you're hacking the Gibson. I've only played for about 20 minutes beyond the tutorial, so I haven't experienced everything, but it seems like it could get pretty deep. Like pretty much all Ambrosia games, it's shareware, so you can play for free and see how you like it, but you can only get so far without registering.

They keep coming out of the duffel. I keep sucking them up with the vacuum.

There was a bunch of hockey gear on our apartment balcony last week. We got a notice from the apartment management that we had to move it inside (something about not being allowed to use our balcony for storage, it's in the lease). While moving some of the gear inside, I found a couple nests attached to a pair of hockey pants and another piece of gear. I cleaned off most of the gear and brought it inside. I had gotten everything in except for a large duffel bag that also contained hockey gear. I was about to bring it inside when I noticed a wasp or hornet climb inside through one of the holes. I was worried they had started a nest inside the bag. After getting up some nerve, I kicked the bag, then jumped back inside the apartment and shut the screen door. I waited vigilantly but didn't see anything happen. I slowly opened the screen door, and reached out with my hand and unzipped the bag a ways, then jumped back inside and closed the door and watched. About 30 seconds later, a wasp (or hornet) flew towards the bag, and I figured my worst fears had been realized.

Today, after about five or six days of inaction towards the bag. I went onto the balcony and gave it another kick. Nothing happened. I decided that it would be safe to bring it inside, so I did. About five minutes later, a wasp made a b-line (no pun intended) from the dining area to the balcony. I opened the door and let him out. A short while later, another flew into the screen door, so I opened it and let him out. Then another, and another. It's been almost 15 minutes since the last one, but I don't think it's over. Eventually they'll all either escape or die, but I don't know how long that's going to take. Then I'll have to clean the bag of hive remnants and wasp (or hornet) corpses.

Six months into the new year, I finally developed and scanned some photos from New Year's Eve.

It turns out that USA19QI1P1 is my Keyspan USB-Serial Adapter. I noticed it the last time I sync'd my PalmIII.

Normally the punchline would be "... and Jack left town," but today I mean it. First is a photo of me attempting to whack a golf ball down the driving range:

The second is a weird thing that started showing up on my computer:

I don't know what USA19Q... is or where it came from.