A Little Fantasy
by | posted in: Art, Fun | 0

No, not the naughty kind!

Ugh, you perverts who immediately thought of something naughty should be ashamed of yourselves! Also? You are my people.
Seriously, though, this is the totally safe for work kind of fantasy. And by “little”, what I mean is “miniature”, as in small dioramas. Because, that’s what I have for you this week. Videos, brought to you via MAKE Magazine, of tiny pseudo-Medieval buildings and villages created, from scratch, by someone who goes by the pseudonym “Landvaettr”. They’re kind of beautiful and, for me, fascinating due to the shift in scale and super high level of detail. It’s brilliant work.
So go check out Weekend Watch: Explore the Miniature World of Landvaettr’s Lair! It’s really fun and, as the name implies, perfect for a weekend distraction.
And, we all know the weekend really starts on Friday!

SXSW 2018 Music Stars
by | posted in: Art, Fun, music, News and Current Events | 2

As picked by National Public Radio.

When I was in college, a good friend of mine who happened to be a jazz musician and a dual English and History major, told me I was “tragically unhip”. Sadly, he was not wrong. I’ve spent no small amount of time since then trying to shake that reputation, mostly without success. But, along the way, I somehow managed to rub up against a little bit of cool. And, I’ve allowed myself to explore those who are the opposite of “tragically unhip”, namely indie musicians. My musical tastes were curtailed a bit when I was married the first time, but after the divorce, I started to expand my musical horizons again. Aided by the internet and a great music-blog culture, I’ve found lots of really good, enjoyable, and obscure music. Enough to impress my wife with my eclectic and voracious tastes, though maybe not enough to impress my now professional saxophone-playing friend.
In any case, I’m always on the look-out for new music and new musicians. Now that I live in Texas, I’ve got a much more heightened awareness of South By South West (aka SXSW), which is happening this week. It’s become so much more, but SXSW started as a music festival. And lots of new music still finds its start there. Since I’m old now, and too busy to actually attend SXSW this year, I just went to NPR’s SXSW 2018 coverage page and started listening to music. It’s all free to stream, and if you hit the Austin 100: A SXSW Mixtape sub-page, you can download their 100 song picks from the festival for your listening pleasure. Totally worth the small effort, I assure you. Especially if you’re looking for the “next big thing” in music.

Enjoy the tunes, and your weekend!

Reaction Time Is A Factor
by | posted in: About The Author, Novell | 0

That’s not just a line from my favorite movie.

Seriously, I’ve always said that the real secret to success is not really just hard work and “paying your dues”.  It is those things, too, but it’s mostly about making the most of opportunities.  In other words, it’s luck.
Now, don’t freak out.  It’s not entirely about luck.  But, when a lucky break comes, and they do come on a pretty regular basis, the people who succeed are the ones who can make the most of the opportunity.  Now, my little pet theory is at least partially backed by science.  According to Scientific American, the Role of Luck in Life Success is Far Greater Than We Realized.  I can even give you an example from my own life.  If you look at my resume, you’ll see that I majored in Marketing in college, thinking that I would go into sales, more or less like my father did.  But, then, while trying to figure out a way to break into sales in the hospitality industry, I was offered an entry-level position in an IT department at the hotel where I was working.  That’s lucky break number one.  Then, while working there, the girl I was dating at the time (if you can count two dates as “dating”), pushed me a bit about where I saw my career going and what my ambitions were.  Until then, I didn’t really have any ambitions.  (Thanks, Eve!  In a way, you launched my longer-term career!)  While I was pondering that, a co-worker got an invite to a seminar about certification training for the hot, new LAN OS, Novell Netware.  (Yes, that was a very long time ago!)  He couldn’t go, but I could and I did.  The “door prize” was full training and tests toward getting a Certified Novell Engineer certificate, which ran into the thousands of dollars, even back then.  I won!  Lucky break number two!
And, I really made the most of it.  Those two lucky breaks, all of which took place in the space of less than three years, started me on a professional journey that has weathered many economic down-turns and personal challenges, all the while providing a very, very comfortable living for me and my family.

But, you can bet that I never, ever forget the role that luck, and my reaction time in capitalizing on it, played in my success.

A Game of Flowers
by | posted in: Art, Fun | 1

This game is a little existential, but not in too challenging a way.

I’ll be honest, I’m a bit beaten down this week. There’s been a lot. A lot of problems, a lot of work, a lot of everything. And, as a result, I’m just beat. Still, I have a link to share. It’s another game, though, I prefer the non-game mode. It’s actually an unnamed project, but it’s generally being referred to as the “flower game”. There is music, so if you’re playing at work, turn your speakers down before you hit the link to keep it on the down-low.
The idea is that with a few key-strokes you change the otherwise automatically generated patterns flowing out from the center of the screen. In “drawing machine” mode, you just get to watch the trippy patterns form. In “arcade machine” mode, it’s a game where you try to direct the squiggly shapes toward targets while things try to interfere with you.
I stuck with “drawing machine” mode, because, well, that’s where I was this week.

Anyway, it’s not much but it does keep the tradition alive.
Enjoy, and as the hard-working cop in Blade Runner told Deckard, “Have a better one!”

Universal Paperclips
by | posted in: Art, Fun | 0

An existentialist game about artificial intelligence and, yes, paperclips.

A couple of weeks ago, a friend of mine who read my post about the web-based game, Seedship told me about this fascinating and strangely compelling game, Universal Paperclips. If you follow that link, click on the box in the center to start. There’s no on-site help. There’s no explanation. Just a simple web interface that, if anything, suggests you may want to click a button labeled “Make a paperclip”. That’s it. That’s all.
But, if you are bold enough to start clicking, you’ll quickly find yourself drawn into the strangest game I think I’ve ever played. Initially, you’ll invest a few minutes, to get things rolling, but at a certain point, you’ll find that everything seems to roll along by itself with only a little intervention on your part periodically.

I don’t want to give away anything but I did let my simulation run for more than a week while only playing a few minutes a day. Though, it’s hard to tell, because it did get strangely consuming. I assume that if I let the simulation keep running, it would eventually end only with the heat-death of the simulated universe of the game.
And, if you decide to play, and get stuck, there is a Universal Paperclips WIKI, to help you. I admit, near the end of my time playing, I used it to confirm a few things.
If you have some time, and some patience, try this game. You won’t be disappointed!

Free Entertainment
by | posted in: Fun, music | 0

Free is relative, but a lot of entertainment can be relatively free.

Regular visitors to my blog will know that I love free things. I’m also very much like an ancient Roman in that I love nothing more than laying on a couch while eating and being entertained. Yes, it’s decadent and primitive of me, but, well, there it is. The problem with all that, of course, is that if I’m being lazy, I probably can’t afford to pay for a lot of entertainment. Thankfully, the internet has solved that problem for me!
Specifically, Gizmodo’s guide to How To Find The Best Free Movies and Music On The Web will show you, and me, where to find free entertainment. They have links to the old favorites like PBS and the Internet Archive, but they have other sources that are more obscure. Or, they have suggestions that may be familiar, but not the first thing you think of as a source, like listening to music via YouTube, which I know I’ve done.

In any case, the guide is free and so are the sources they list and since you’re not working this Friday afternoon, you may want to see what they have available to amuse you.

Hacker Games
by | posted in: Fun, Fun and Games, The Day Job | 1

Sounds like a good title for a book!

Except it’s not.
In my day job, I’m a professional geek. And, what I mean by that is that I work with computers for money. It seems like the vast majority of the guys my age who got into computers professionally did so because they were inspired by the movie [amazon_textlink asin=’B0011EQBOS’ text=’War Games’ template=’ProductLink’ store=’jkhoffman-20′ marketplace=’US’ link_id=’38c6d846-0d15-11e8-a8f6-f12f91a6eb2a’]. Not me, though. I fell into it a little sideways and my interest in the computer security angle of my work came from [amazon_textlink asin=’B00WGUWDVG’ text=’Sneakers’ template=’ProductLink’ store=’jkhoffman-20′ marketplace=’US’ link_id=’53433e58-0d15-11e8-991f-01aca75f720d’]. I mean, who wouldn’t want to be Martin Bishop? A computer geek that looks like Robert Redford and could swing sleeping with Mary McDonnell? Seriously, sign me up!
The reality is, of course, a little less sexy. Trust me. No one who looked like Robert Redford was walking around DEFCON. Though, to be fair, I did learn to pick locks sitting next to a very nice and more than moderately attractive young woman. Who, incidentally, learned lock picking faster than any guy at the table.
In any case, times have changed since the early 90’s and all the harmless exploration I did when I first got into IT is mostly illegal now. Though, I’ll never forget helping an international guest at the Hyatt Regency Chicago get remote access to her VMS and find the program she needed to run. She had authorization, of course, but no idea how to find what she needed and I was blind in a VMS system for the first time. When I get her into her program, I think she clapped and then hugged me. It was cool! And FUN! But, opportunities like that are few and far between. And, there are plenty of places that won’t hire someone who has a criminal record. So, how do you recreate that experience without risking jail time?
Wargames by OverTheWire. These fine hackers have put together more than a dozen “games” meant to test your skill at electronic breaking and entering. And, honestly, a little bit more. Each game let’s you connect to it, most often with SSH via its own, dedicated SSH port, and then let’s you go after the rest. I haven’t had the chance to do much here yet, honestly, but the OverTheWire gang suggests you start with Bandit, which is aimed at absolute beginners and consists of 27 “levels”. Each “level” gives you information to “beat” the next “level”. It sounds like fun, but, then again, I am a pretty hardcore computer geek.

So, there you go! It’s a free introduction to computer security in game form. The perfect Friday diversion for the aspiring network geek or hacker!

Escape the Planet
by | posted in: Fun | 3

No, not for real, just in a browser-based game.

I’ve often said that if things are as bad on this beautiful, blue marble as the news would have us believe, then we should throw all our resources into getting off it and founding a colony somewhere else. Like Mars, for instance. As it turns out, I’m not the only one to think that way, but for some reason, people take Elon Musk more seriously than me when he says it. Be that as it may, I still have often dreamed of being one of those brave travelers who fling themselves into the starry night and try to begin civilization again on some distant world, under the light of an alien sun. Sadly, I suspect that I’ll die long before interplanetary colonization really gets going, much less interstellar travel.
Still, the subject has been a rich mine for writers and game creators alike, which brings me to the Friday Fun Link I have to share with you; Seedship. It’s a simple, text-based game of interstellar exploration and colonization you can play right in your browser! Just follow that link and you can take the part of a ship’s artificial intelligence, helping colonists find a suitable home and survive long enough to make a life there.
It’s pretty simple game-play, but I have to admit, it is kind of fun. And, of course, it’s a quiet way to spend a couple minutes of your Friday having some fun.

Try it out and “escape the planet”, at least for a few minutes at lunch!

Work – Fatherland – Order
by | posted in: About The Author, Fun, News and Current Events | 0

My own political leanings often surprise me.

I should start by saying that I don’t think of myself as a particularly political person in any sense of the word. Sure, I have some very strong opinions about some things, but I mostly keep that kind of thing to myself because I hate the idea of becoming a bore. And, I think I’m a terrifically boring person, though my wife and friends assure me that is not the case. In fact, recently when I pumped out a bunch of messages about the net neutrality changes and the fight in the House and Senate to repeal that very, very bad FCC decision, at least one friend was so surprised he had to ask me about it. Which gave me the opportunity to educate him. It was nice.
But, what the title of this post refers to is the results of the quiz I took at PolitiScales. The quiz is meant to measure where you fall on 8 axes, including the one we think of most; Progressive vs. Conservative. I was surprised to find out that I was only 31% Conservative, but 57% Progressive. More stunning to me was that I rated 57% Regulationist vs. 17% “Laissez-faire” and 52% Nationalist vs. 31% Internationalist. The other axes include; Constructivist vs. Essentialist, Communism vs. Capitalism, Ecology vs. Productivist, Revolutionist vs. Reformist and Rehabilitative Justice vs. Punitive Justice. Again, it was a little eye-opening to me as I’d always thought of myself as both more conservative and global than they measured me as being. Of course, this is just one relatively short quiz and my thoughts on all this are more complicated than they can easily measure with a multiple choice questionnaire. Still, I encourage you all to take the quiz and see how you feel about it. And, maybe, give a little thought to your political life before the mid-term elections later this year.

When To Buy What
by | posted in: About The Author, Personal Care, Red Herrings | 1

Yes, you can save money by buying at the right time.

About a week ago, our dryer died. Or maybe our washing machine died. All we know is, right in the middle of a load, my wife started to smell the most horrible stench of burning electronics. She turned everything off and unplugged it all, but the fried electric smell of dead appliances lingered in the air for a couple days afterward. It was sad. But, on the other hand, that washer and dryer were over sixteen years old and, frankly, due for replacement. Actually, that’s one reason we’re not entirely sure which one became a deadly house fire potential hazard. When we refinanced our house last year, we agreed that when either of these appliances died, we would replace them both. We even set aside the money to pay for them, so that we wouldn’t go back into credit card debt after working so hard to get out from under those immoral interest rates. Sadly, they didn’t wait until the right month so that we could save money with a good sale, because the best time to buy household appliances is apparently November, especially around “Black Friday”. (Which is okay, really, because we already knew what we wanted to get and they almost never seem to go on sale.)

Are you surprised that I know there’s a good time to buy appliances? Don’t be. I only know because finance websites always seem to publish a guide to what month is best to buy what consumer good. This year, take a look at the one at Time’s Money section’s Month-by-Month Guide for the Best Time to Buy Everything. For instance, they suggest that the best time to buy a TV or other consumer electronics is the second half of January and February. Or that May might be the best time for furniture sales, which I did NOT know! In any case, if you can afford to wait and plan, you might be able to score yourself a good deal with their guide.

Good luck with your saving and spending in 2018!
(And, for those of you who are curious, we bought an American made washer and dryer; Speed Queen, though we actually got two separate units, not the combo.)

 

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