Month: June 2011

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A Query for Macintosh Users

My mother just stopped by with her Mac laptop to ask my help with something, and after an hour or so of futzing around and Googling, I couldn’t figure out the solution. Maybe one of you can offer some guidance!

The problem: there is a webcam from Hawaii that she likes to have up when she’s online. (Specifically, this one — apparently that’s the beach she and my father stayed on when they vacationed there last.) At some point recently, though, the webcam has stopped working. No image loads, no nothing. (The webcam does work on my computer, though, which gave me temptation to be able to say to a Mac user, “Get a PC!” Those types of situations almost never present themselves…and when one does, I can’t go for it because, you know, it’s my mom.)

Anyway, below the webcam window is a link to a Windows Media Player plug-in that you’re supposed to install if the thing isn’t working. So I go through the proper steps to run said plug-in — specifically, this plug-in — but when I restart Safari, still nothing on the web-cam. I restart the Mac, and still, no web-cam.

So I start tinkering around, and in the settings for said plug-in, I find an option that says something like “Use this plug-in for Windows Media Player content”. However, that option was grayed out, so I could neither check nor uncheck its box. Googling a bit more, I find that apparently when Safari is running in 64-bit mode, it can adversely affect the functionality of certain media-related plug-ins. A-ha!, thinks I, as I then look up how to set Safari to run in 32-bit mode instead of 64-bit mode. It turns out that there’s a simple way to do this: you access certain settings for Safari in the “Finder” thing, and then just check the box that says “Run Safari in 32-bit mode”. Only problem?

No such box exists on my mother’s computer. As far as I can tell, her version of Safari will only run in 64-bit mode. No other option is available. So, I’m stymied and unable to get her web-cam to show her pretty pictures of a beach in Hawaii. Anybody out there got any suggestions?

(And Justin Long said that things just sorta work on Macs. Yeah, right!)

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Sunday Burst of Weird and AWESOME!

Oddities and Awesome abound!

:: When a half-marathon runs by his house, what’s an energetic young dog to do?

:: A while back I posted a video of a space shuttle launch from the vantage point of a solid-fuel rocket booster. Here’s a similar video.

It’s not that interesting a video for the first minute or two, because of the vantage point of the camera, but then we reach the point (at about the 1:50 mark) where the booster rockets separate and fall back to Earth, and it becomes amazing. You gradually see the second booster recede until it’s invisible…and the Earth just circles around lazily, getting bigger all the time…and then the other rocket booster comes back into view. And if you freeze the frame at exactly the 4:28 mark, you can actually see the thrust exhaust contrail making a giant bow all the way from the launch pad to the other booster, still free-falling back to Earth.

The screen goes black at about the 5:38 mark; stick with it, though, because the video switches to the perspective of a different camera at that point. Which camera? Watch!

:: A Twitter followee of mine posted this: The world’s ten geekiest houses. It’ll be obvious which is my favorite, but they’re all really amazing.

More next week!

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39-37

As of this writing, the Pittsburgh Pirates are 39-37. They’re close to entering July with a record at or over .500. That would be amazing.

I was thinking about the Pirates’ 1992 season, which started amazingly — they charged out of the gate, playing five or six games and then going on a nine-game winning streak — and ended with the most heartbreaking end to a sporting event in which I had a rooting interest that I’ve ever seen. Seriously: the Francisco Cabrera hit in the bottom of the ninth in Game Seven of the NLCS that year was more gutwrenching than even Scott Norwood’s miss in Super Bowl XXV. While the Bills were on the edge the entire game of that Super Bowl, the Pirates really looked like they were going to break through to the World Series after two consecutive years in which they lost the NLCS. They took a 2-0 lead to the bottom of the ninth, only to see a nightmare of an inning unfold in which the Braves put up three to win the pennant.

I watched my fair share of Pirates games that season, whenever I could. ESPN had the Pirates a lot, and I’d watch them play the Cubs on WGN and the Braves on TBS. One of those Braves games stands out as one of the most hard-luck games I’ve ever seen a team lose. I remember the Pirates pitcher, Danny Jackson, for whom they had traded despite his awful record at that point in the season because they desperately needed left-handed pitching, throwing a masterful game but losing, 1-0. It was worse, even, than that, however. I was able to do some research and track down the actual box score from that game, and Ye Gods! Jackson pitched seven innings, and a reliever tossed the eighth. Between the two of them, they combined to throw a one-hitter. But that one hit was a solo home run by David Justice, and that one run would be all the Braves would need.

The Pirates actually had a great chance to score. I don’t recall if anyone was on base at the time, but center fielder Andy Van Slyke hit a ball deep to center field. Deep to center field. In fact, he hit it out of the park for a home run — or, rather, it would have been a home run had Braves CF Otis Nixon not run to the wall, jumped up, stuck his glove about a foot over the fence, and hauled in the ball. It was an astonishing catch, truly (you can watch it here), and one of the biggest “Oh, come on!” moments I’ve ever experienced as a sports fan.

Oh well. But apparently the Pirates are getting good again! Huzzah!

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Overalls weather!


Overalls weather!, originally uploaded by Jaquandor.

Usually, from June to mid-September at the earliest, I might get to wear overalls a handful of times, because it’s just too warm for them. Not that overalls are especially hot, per se, but the bib and the back part do tend to rest where…well, where I tend to produce the most sweat. I’m better at dealing with heat now than I used to be, but I’m still not up to wearing overalls in summer.

I’m not sure how the rest of this summer is going to play out, but so far in June, we seem to have a pattern going where it will get seasonably warm (or even a bit warmer) for a few days, say five or six days, and then we’ll get two or three days of unseasonably cool days that lots of folks whine about but which I find highly pleasant and refreshing. This weekend is one of the cool weekends — highs in the low 60s, which is not usual for June in these parts! So I get to wear overalls this weekend, huzzah!

Will this pattern hold? I doubt it, but I’d love it if it did. I’d love to be able to wear overalls to the Erie County Fair, but it’s always too hot by Fair time. We’re knocking on the door of July, which is always my least favorite month (mainly because of the heat), so we’ll see.

By the way, that plant in front of me is one of two ivy plants that we have. That one is actually grown from a cutting I made off the original plant, which you can’t see because it’s behind me (except for one tendril sticking out from, well, behind my arse). Usually our ivies shed most of their leaves over the winter, even though we bring them inside, but that didn’t happen this year, so both of them are doing abnormally well for being this point in the summer. Also note the hummingbird feeder — we have three, The Wife loves hummingbirds — and the hummingbird light next to the feeder. It’s solar powered, so it charges through the day and lights up at night.

I like our balcony, and I wish it got enough sun that we could have a real producing tomato plant. That line of trees there, on the right side of the photo, keeps going well past where the camera is, giving us nice shade but also enough shade that tomato plants will grow but not produce fruit. Oh well.

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“She doesn’t get eaten by the eels at this time.”

Peter Falk died the other day, after living a good, long life of acting. Of course his most famous role was as Detective Columbo, and naturally I saw a whole bunch of variations on his standard “Oh, yes, one more thing…” quirk as Columbo on Twitter and Facebook yesterday. I love Columbo as well, although I was a bit too young to really enjoy it in its first run; I came to know Columbo through re-runs in syndication years later and through ABC’s resurrection of the character in the late 80s. (One episode I recall had William Shatner as the murderer, who was also a Rush Limbaugh-type talk radio loudmouth. Shatner and Falk played off each other pretty well in that episode.)

As much as I like Columbo, though, Peter Falk’s iconic role for me is — and always will be — the Grandfather who reads to Fred Savage in The Princess Bride. All he does is sit in a chair and gruffly read a book, but it’s just so pitch-perfect a performance. The final line of The Princess Bride is, for my money, one of the best closing lines to a movie ever, and the movie gives that line to Peter Falk. The line? It’s just three words, and Falk delivers it perfectly.

Here’s a video I found, with Falk’s entrance in the first scene and his exit in the last scene of The Princess Bride, complete with that oh, so perfect final line.

Thanks for the entertainment, Peter Falk!

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Rainbow over New York


Rainbow over New York, originally uploaded by JaredsEyes.

The New York State Senate passes a bill that, when signed into law by the Governor, will make it legal for homosexuals to marry in this state.

I’ve been very bitter and discouraged on the political front lately, for a lot of reasons, so it’s awfully heartening to see that yes, we do get it right once in a while. New York’s state legislature usually resembles a tire fire that’s been dropped on top of a train wreck. That they managed to make this happen is nothing short of astonishing.

Connecticut.
Iowa.
Massachusetts.
New Hampshire.
Vermont.
New York.

Forty-four to go. Who’s next?

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Correspondence of a Class Clown

Here’s a love letter someone wrote to his beloved:

My own sweet bright light, Sally:

These trees are still young and new but already strong and sturdy — and with a long life-span ahead of them. JUST LIKE OUR LOVE

They are also bathed in a golden glow — as I am, when I’m in your presence. Your love bathes me in warm, golden wonderfulness.

Here’s another, from the same fellow to the same lady:

The King loves his Queen — and decrees that she shall receive all his kisses, touches, hugs and love forevermore

In return, he wants her to hold him in her heart for every moment they’re apart

This same love-sick gentleman left notes for Sally, on post-its and index cards:

It you were any prettier, the Sun would be embarrassed that you outshone him.

I’m so in love with you I could burst — but I promise to clean up the mess.

They’re not all like that, though. Some of them are a bit more adult in tone, and some are downright dirty.

You’re the Queen Kong of my heart.

You can climb my skyscraper anytime!

So, who is this guy? Who on Earth could have written love letters and notes like that? Well, by way of a clue, on the very first letter up above, I omitted the fact that he signed it “Pumpkin Balls”.

Turns out, it was this guy:

George Carlin wrote these, and many many more, to his second wife, Sally Wade. Carlin’s first wife (of more than 30 years) passed away in 1997; a year later Carlin married Sally Wade, and he remained married to her until his untimely death in 2008. Apparently they met in a bookstore, when Sally Wade’s dog Spot hit it off with Carlin (who loved dogs and once claimed that “Life is a series of dogs”). Carlin would then apparently express his love for her by constantly writing her little letters, notes, postcards, and whatever else he could get his hands on.

A lot of it is goofily sentimental; a lot of it is downright odd; and a good portion of it is — well, you still can’t say a lot of that stuff on teevee. Wade has gathered a lot of this together in a book called The George Carlin Letters: The Permanent Courtship of Sally Wade. It’s all very sweet, and very Carlin. What’s nice about this book is that the actual notes are reproduced, in Carlin’s writing (which is sometimes very difficult to read), along with occasional doodles. Read in sequence, the book forms a portrait of the other, non-public side of Carlin’s final decade. I personally found it more pleasurable to dip through the book at random.

Carlin’s humor took a decidedly darker tone in his later life, but he wasn’t all gloom and doom, as this book shows.

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Something for Thursday

I’ve been on a big SF-reading kick lately (memo to self: blog about books), so here’s some SF music: Michael Giacchino’s end-credits suite from Star Trek 2009. I wasn’t sure what to make of this score when I first heard it, a few weeks before I saw the movie, but it really grew on me to the point where it’s one of my favorite scores from the last ten years of film music. It’s just big, brassy, explodey-spaceshippy space opera music. I especially love how right off the bat he uses Alexander Courage’s famous theme from Star Trek: The Original Series; and at about the 1:00 mark, he blends in the main theme that he composed for this film.

Of all facets of the 2009 Trek, it’s the music that I think is most successful in capturing the tone of Original Series Trek at its best — intelligent space adventure that is optimistic about our future.

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Sigh….

New York State’s awesome legislature has today addressed a long-standing issue that needed resolution…by making corn the state vegetable.

Corn is, of course, a grain.

I am more and more reminded of George Carlin discussing news media reporting on Mickey Mouse’s birthday: “No wonder nobody takes our country seriously anymore; we spend valuable television time informing our citizens of the age of an imaginary rodent.”

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