makeshiftmind

Because I’ve been listening to one of the greatest metal bands ever: Living Sacrifice. That’s right, they’ve come back to say “What now, contemporary christian music?? Bring it!” , and even though I’m not a Christian anymore, I can always enjoy me some LS. If you’re interested in treating yourself to pure awesomeness, you can surf your way over to their myspace page (may the Internets forgive them) and listen for yourself. Be prepared: THERE WILL BE BLOOD.

I’ve been doing a lot of interviews here at work lately, because we’re trying to find a few mid-grade .NET developers to augment our staff.  One thing that always surprises me is how little developers actually know about object oriented programming.  We typically ask questions like: “Describe inheritance.” or “What is the difference between an abstract class and an interface?”.  I’ve been trying to think of some new questions to ask, and as I was heading into work this morning, one popped into my head:

Q: What is Redneck polymorphism?
A: The ability to use any tool as a hammer.

Yeah, it’s not funny unless you’re a programmer.

I’ve heard about Technorati in the past but never really bothered to check it out. It’s blogging aggregation site that brings together information from a lot of different blogs and indexes it so you can search for things you’re interested in. Here is my Technorati profile.

…and do yard work today.  I have the day off, so instead of squandering it (my preferred mode of vacationing) I got out the mower, the trimmer, several yard tools, trash cans, and our ladder.  I had the front lawn mowed and trimmed by noon, and decided to tackle the clogged gutters and our miserable landscaping next.

I pulled the ladder around back where the lowest point of our roof is, and realized that to get maximum height from the ladder I’d need to open the gate to our back yard, which I did.  I positioned the ladder and climbed to the top rung (you know, the one that has that warning label on it informing you that it’s not really a rung), only to realize that the ladder was really too short for a roof expedition.  Nah, I thought, I’ll just hoist myself up.  I threw my work gloves onto the roof, took a small jump, and with no shortage of huffing managed to drag myself onto the shingles.  I was wearing shorts (bad idea) and scuffed my knee, which started bleeding, but it was manageable.  Then I looked down and realized…

I wouldn’t be able to lower myself back onto the ladder.  If I tried to slip over the edge feet-first, my weight would quickly pull me over and if I didn’t hit the top of the ladder just right, it would topple and I would hit the concrete.  Unacceptable.  My only alternative was to move over to the side of the roof where there was grass and slowly lower myself over the edge until I slipped off, hoping the soft earth would cushion the fall.

And that’s not what happened.  Instead, when I landed my right ankle took a nasty, painful twist.  I managed to semi-drag myself into the house, threw ice on it right away and elevated it to prevent swelling.  Even though there was a fair degree of pain, it wasn’t too unbearable, and I could lightly put weight on it so I was fairly certain it wasn’t broken.  There was minimal swelling and no discoloration, and while it remains uncomfortable and I hobble like a broken wind-up toy, I think it will heal quickly.

A few hours later I got a call from my friend Steve.  I told him what happened and he said, “Dude, what were you doing on the roof to begin with?  Geeks aren’t allowed up there.  For their own safety.”

I promptly agreed, and will play video games religiously until my health is restored.

Ben Stein’s pseudo-documentary Expelled, a film about the alleged prejudice against intelligent design advocates in scientific establishments, has been receiving a lot of negative attention in the scientific community because it borrows heavily from Michael Moore’s playbook, i.e., it’s a dishonest film that does not present facts accurately.

Scientific American, a very popular scientific magazine, has written an interesting article called “Six Things in Expelled That Ben Stein Doesn’t Want You to Know…” that details six of the film’s most disturbing flaws. Atheist and evolutionist Richard Dawkins, who was interviewed for the film, claims that, among other things, he and his colleagues were told that they were being interviewed for a totally different film, and that their quotes were taken out of context and twisted. He has posted an article called “Lying for Jesus” that heavily criticizes the film. The film’s Wikipedia article catalogs the controversy surrounding the film with quite a bit of detail.

Whether you are a creationist, an evolutionist, and ID advocate or just undecided, twisting facts, distorting quotes, and citing material out of context is a very low way to solicit your position. Don’t accept less than the truth.

Today is the official launch of Ubuntu 8.04. Ubuntu is a Linux operating system that is developed by a strong open source community, and is freely available to download, use, and distribute. An operating system is the software on your computer that allows you to run programs. Windows is an operating system, and so is Mac OSX. Ubuntu is, arguably, the most popular Linux operating system for desktop PCs, and is steadily encroaching on the server market as well.

Some reasons to download and use Ubuntu:

1. You can’t afford (or refuse to pay for) Windows Vista or Mac OSX Leopard
2. You want to learn how computers work (Linux hides nothing from you — you can literally find out how everything works)
3. You’re a mad h@X0r and want to show off your sKI11z
4. You like to try new things, and aren’t afraid to reinstall your operating system a few times just to get the hang of it
5. You want to be part of a helpful community of computer geeks who enjoy tinkering as much as you do
6. You like the word “Ubuntocalypse”
7. You feel peer pressure from this blog post
8. You loathe M$ and wish IE would die a slow, painful digital death
9. You like pretty graphics, but really get excited when you see white text on a black background and a blinking cursor
10. You want to court the favor of the gods

This is like, every night at my house.

There are, fundamentally, only two causes of the progress of the nineteenth century — the same two causes which you will find at the root of any happy, benevolent, progressive era in human history. One cause is psychological, the other existential — or: one pertains to man’s consciousness, the other to the physical conditions of his existence. The first is reason, the second is freedom. And when I say “freedom,” I do not mean poetic sloppiness, such as “freedom from want” or “freedom from fear” or “freedom from the necessity of earning a living.” I mean “freedom from compulsion — freedom from rule by physical force.” Which means: political freedom.

These two — reason and freedom — are corollaries, and their relationship is reciprocal: when men are rational, freedom wins; when men are free, reason wins.

Their antagonists are: faith and force. These, also, are corollaries: every period of history dominated by mysticism, was a period of statism, of dictatorship, of tyranny. Look at the Middle Ages — and look at the political systems of today.

– “Faith and Force: The Destroyers of the Modern World”, Ayn Rand