Fast as in CGI

... as opposed to "Fast as in Not Eating", which reminds me, I'm hungry.

Anyway, I haven't posted much this weekend because _sps_ was here, and I usually prefer to spend time with him than with the computer (although I DO try to check my mail regularly -- I'm not a luddite).

Saturday, we hung out at a local Cafe and played "Homeworlds", which is a simple abstract conquer-the-universe game played with little colored pyramids. There are only 60 pyramids used (5 copies each of 3 sizes of pyramid, in four colors), and the game rules are quite simple and yet the game itself is fiendishly complex as the interactions and options available to you at any point can be astronomical. What's worse, everything has a cost, and its usually not obvious. So far we've only managed to play 2 games, and each time we've discovered whole new areas of complexity. What's more, its a game for 2-6 (I think) players, and some of the rules only matter when you have more than 2 players, so I expect it may take a while to master.

While at the cafe we also slapped together a spec for a general purpose macro language for CSS that shouldn't take me too long to implement (at least, it won't take long to implement the portion that I actually need for now).

Sunday we just sat around at home and talked. We didn't do much since I slept in so much. After he left, I started writing the framework for the CSS macro stuff. I've just now finished the framework, and IT WORKS!  Its currently pretty much a null-process (albeit with fast dispatch and smart caching), but it seems to work correctly with Apache, so I think I've solved the last of the hurdles before getting the new website up. This has taken me FOREVER and I'll be happy when I can call it finished.

Slept in.

... or is it obvious?

Even after my previous late-night post I was unable to fall asleep. Mainly because I had slept so much the night before. I finally conked out around 6:30 am, and 'awoke' to my alarm at 1:00 pm. I ended up drifting in and out of sleep until 3:00, while the radio played, and then I finally dragged myself out of bed.

The first thing in my e-mail inbox was an interesting job opportunity at National Bank, but it turns out you have to jump through a million hoops to apply for a job there, so it took me the better part of 2 hours. Anyway, I'm now ready to read my comics pages, catch up on LJ, and get me some more coffee. I may even get some more FastCGI stuff done, now that I have a working stub.

5 Questions

Do YOU want to play 5 Questions?

1. Leave a comment, saying you want to be interviewed.
2. I will respond; I'll ask you five questions.
3. You'll update your website with my five questions, and your five answers.
4. You'll include this explanation.
5. You'll ask other people five questions when they want to be interviewed.
   

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This set of questions come from denizsarikaya.

Now, without further ado:

If you were stranded on a desert island, what 3 books (that are already available, thank you very much) would you most want to have with you?

Oooh, you meanie! They have to actually exist? Darn! You know, I've had this plan for years to write a book called "Rebooting Civilization" (working title) that describes how to build a working satellite transceiver, starting from rocks, sand, shells and bamboo...

Okay, so, I think I'll go with:

1. Alone on a Desert Island by Ginny McReynolds, which is a Biography of Alexander Selkirk, the inspiration for Robinson Crusoe.
2. An Island to Oneself: Six Years on a Desert Island by Tom Neale, which is a real-life account of desert island survival in the 40's.
3. A good survival medical guide. Something like Ditch Medicine : Advanced Field Procedures For Emergencies by Hugh Coffee.

If you had the choice between seeing colour without colour-blindness or enjoying tomatoes as a food, which would you choose and why?

This one is easy, I'd go for the color vision. You see, there are lots of foods that I enjoy, so I don't feel I'm actually missing much by not liking tomatos. As well, although people are sometimes puzzled by the fact that I don't like them, acceptance of food preferences is well established in society.  None of this is true with color-blindness. People never seem to simply accept it. They always want to quiz me on what color I think things are. This is something I HATE. As well, when in a social situation where I feel pressured, I can always eat a tomato if I must. Its not like I'm allergic to them. Whereas when in a similar situation involving seeing colors, there is NOTHING I can do.

What's an amusing travel story you would like to tell?

Hmm. This was the hardest question to answer. I'm sure I have dozens if not hundreds of travel anecdotes I can tell, but none spring to mind...  Ah, okay, I have one: Many years ago, when I just turned something like 15, and my younger brother Vaughan was 13 (about to be 14) we flew to Australia on vacation. It was a hastily organized flight as my Father's parents were having some sort of medical crisis, and there were anxious murmers that if we didn't visit them NOW we might not see them again before it was too late. To this day, I don't know what was up with that, as both my grandparents seemed (to me) to be in excellent health for very old people, and they both lived for many more years. On the other hand, it seems we weren't the only ones who panicked as my Great Uncle Jeff (Grandfather's brother) and his wife Enid had flown there from England as well. (this was the first and only time I ever met them). Anyway, many things happened on that trip, but it was the flight to Australia I want to talk about.

We flew to San Francisco (IIRC) and took a Quantas flight from there. We ended up flying on Christmas Eve because we had booked so late. We never really had Christmas that year, but I've never regretted going to Australia instead. Anyway, the airplane was almost completely empty. Just after we took off from the States the pilot announced that being a Quantus flight, all alcoholic drinks were traditionally on the house, but due to US air regulations they would have to charge us for any drinks we bought before we made our stop in Hawaii. They also said that because there were so few people, and they had a full complement of staff, we should feel free to stretch out whereever we wanted, including in First Class, and they would be showing different movies in each class, so we could shop around.

The results of this was that we all got free champagne the moment we left Hawaii, and each had an entire row of seats to lay down on. It made for a much more enjoyable ride. I should also mention that being 15 (or 13) wasn't a hindrance in the alcohol department, as Quantas takes a very Australian attitude towards booze. Our folks had said we could drink, and that was good enough for the staff. I should also mention that the plane had enough champagne on board for all 600 seats, even if only 50 were occupied. Thus there was LOTS of spare champagne and refills for any who wanted. Now, I hadn't really gotten a taste for booze yet at that point, so I had a few glasses and went to sleep. Vaughan was a different story. Sometime in the middle of the night I got up to go to the bathroom, and discovered that my Bro and 3 or 4 of the stewardesses were trying to see how much of the spare they could consume. By all appearances the little party had been going on for some time. My Father discovered much the same thing when he went to the bathroom a few hours later. By all accounts he was highly amused. Vaughan, of course, was horribly embarrased by our interest the next morning and refused to talk about it, so I never did discover whether or not he managed to become a member of the mile high club that night.

Kippered tea, kippered coffee, or kippered apricots?

Well, I really dislike adulterated coffee, so thats out. I know that _sps_ describes Lapsang Sukdong (sp?) as "Kippered Tea", so I don't know. I've never been terribly tempted to try the stuff, but that may just be prejudice. For all I know, I'd like it. On the other hand, I absolutely LOVE apricots, even dried, so I would be willing to try them kippered. I guess apricots it is.

Cheese?

Yes! I love cheese. I don't like them all equally, and there are some cheeses, like blue, that I consider 'cooking' cheeses. I'm not fond of them by themselves, but they can make a wonderful ingredient. I actually have fantasies about being rich enough to have an ever-full basket of exotic cheeses to try on a sideboard, so I can test out a few new ones every day. Sigh...