Peelander Z

Thomas is always saying that I need to get out more because I’m a loser and a hermit and will probably never get laid because you can’t meet chicks on the internet. He’s right, of course. Which is why I agreed to go on a random Poonventure to New Orleans on a Tuesday night. I mean, it wasn’t totally random… We did have a goal. And that goal was Peelander Z (http://www.peelander-z.com/).

Apparently, Peelander Z played here in Lafayette over the weekend. Thomas was so amazed by the show that he had to go see them again in New Orleans and decided to take Sterling, Chris, and I with him. Long story short: We left about 6:45, got there around 10, saw the show and came home.

But what a show it was! I had no idea what to expect. The last rock concert I went to was probably in high school. I don’t really like loud places because I get headaches real bad, but Thomas spoke highly of these guys, so I figured I’d give it a shot. And I’m glad I did.

We got there a little early. While we waited for the venue to fill, we noticed the band hovering around the merch table. The guitarist (Peelander Yellow) and the drummer (Peelander Blue) were wearing normal clothes (jeans and hoodies) and those knit hats that Rastafarians wear. In the balcony, Peelander Red (the bassist) sat brooding. He had dreadlocks and sat knitting a hat similar to what the others were wearing. I figured they (including Peelander Pink – the girl selling the merch) were a bunch of dirty hippies.

You can imagine my surprise when the curtains raised the band came out in brightly colored costumes, throwing confetti and running around through the crowd.

They’ve been described to me as a Japanese punk band, and true to form, there were plenty of punks in the crowd. Mohawks, plaid, chains. Lots of posers dressed in tight black pants. In fact, the only ones not in punk garb were the bartenders, two guys in Peelander cosplay and the band itself. Even so, it was far from what I would call a punk show.

In my mind, there should be a nonstop barrage of drunken guitar riffs and rapid, blasting drum beats combined with politically charged lyrics and a mosh pit in the front row. Indeed, there was a wall of ear bleeding, fast paced sound and a mosh pit in the front row. My visions never once involved costumed musicians adopting the personas of aliens from the planet Peelander.

The show, itself, consisted of no more than three or four songs. In between, instead of a bear break for the musicians, was a constant aural assault behind the heavily accented ramblings of Peelander Yellow, skits involving human bowling pins, acrobatics, Mexican wrestling and audience participation. At one point, the entire band had been replaced, on stage, by members of the audience while the Peelanders ran around jumping off furniture.

I’ve seen some amazing things in my day, but Peelander Z takes the cake. And the pudding. And ice cream. And cookies. And any other desert. It was definitely worth the price of admission. Perhaps the best 10 bucks I’ve ever spent.

Conclusion: MEDIUM RARE!

Until Next Time,

~~Ben

Classic Wisdom: Poon?

I'm totally lazy, and have been working on projects pretty much all day. I've got stuff to write about, but don't have the time to do it justice. Instead of half-assing what could be an entertaining read, I've decided to post a classic wisdom. I'll probably do this a lot in the near future as the semester draws to a close.

This particular classic wisdom is the second wisdom to ever be posted at Poonheads.com. It references this comic: (http://www.poonheads.com/comics/?id=1).

It's interesting to see how far we've come, both artistically and literarily. Enjoy.

The first thing you must know about this particular comic strip is that if you don't get it... you probably never will.

Because this is the very first comic strip that I did for this website, it is, unfortunately, the worst, at least as far as art goes. The thing I don't like about it the most is that I didn't make the panels line up. Ah well... Things get better. Characters get more defined. Art gets cleaner. Jokes only get stupider.

You'll start noticing the significant Top-Down format of the strip. I find that it gives it a certain... something... Sort of like a dramatic effect. If you have a monitor that will display the whole comic at one time, your monitor is too big... This way you can't see the whole thing at once and you really aren't expecting the punch line. I find it helps, anyways.

In the original sketch, Sterling had bangs and a longer pony tail. The adam's apple wasn't added until later, also... I asked Pillboy, "Hey... how can I make Sterling look like a man, opposed to a woman..." and that's what he told me to do... and it helped, I think.

I've gotten two reactions to this strip when I previewed it to my friends: 1) Man... that is the best punch line ever! or 2) ... I don't get it... It doesn't make any sense. I like to use this as a sort of IQ test... if they answer anything like 1, they're okay... if they answer anything like 2... They need to be kicked in the balls... but I'm a putz, so I just walk away frustrated.

Lets see... What else have I got to say before I fall asleep at my computer chair? Oh! I finally got my domain to work at home... yeah I was having some issues with it working on my home computers, but I fixed it by simply reseting the router... wierd shit...

I'll leave you with this:

Potatoes are only good when french fried or chipped and should not be mentioned in ever single conversation ever. You know who you are.

~~Ben

AJAX ... Sorta

Today's mission, at work, was to implement some AJAX. I had this huge form that needed to be saved but not reload the page. AJAX should have handled that. Unfortunately, I don't know how to POST data with AJAX. After a while of browsing Google, I realized that AJAX POSTs were almost the same as AJAX GETs. You send the info via a string. Worse, however, is that PHP won't handle the the POSTed with $_POST or $_GET or anything like that.

I guess this wouldn't be bad if there wasn't so much data to be posting. Unfortunately, I would be posting this huge dynamically generated form. There was way too much data and way too little time to waste trying to code some AJAX. I was getting frustrated and asked Google what I should do. After a while, I came upon a few forum discussion somewhere that were really helpful.

Usually, when you submit a form, it will call the script and load it into the current browser window. Which is something I'm trying to avoid. Something I didn't know was that forms accept the target attribute. It works like a regular link, so if you wanted to have the submitted form load in a new window, you could do:

<form method="POST" action="script.php" target="_blank"></form>

As you may or may not know, the target tag can be used to target a frame when dealing with frame sets. Or iFrames. And iFrames can be manipulated by CSS. In fact, you can make them invisible. So, basically you're submitting a form to an invisible iFrame which reloads the iFrame and not the whole page. It's like magic:


<iframe name="submitFrame" src="" style="display: none"></iframe>
<form method="POST action="script.php" target="submitFrame"></form>


The only downfall is that you can't really any info back from the script. You can't have the script return an XML file or anything like that. So, it's pretty much only good for saving or deleting or something like that. Which is great for what I needed it to do.

I was dealing with a huge form, though. It might take a while to process, looping over quite a few records. Updating, Selecting, Manipulating. That sort of thing. It might be nice if I could update the user on the progress or at least tell them when it finished.

The best way I could think of was to not make the iFrame completely invisible. Just make it small enough. Or at least hide it until I needed to call it. The form processing script could echo "I'm finished" at the end and that would be visible to the user. In the end I had something like the following:

form.html:

<iframe name="submitframe" src="" style="width: 5em; height: 1em;">
<form name="someForm" method="POST" action="script.php" target="submitframe">
<input /> <input /> <input type="submit" />
</form>


script.php

<?php

$arrayOfStuff = $_POST["stuff"];
?>
<span id="status"></span>
<script type="text/javascript">
<?
for($k = 0; $k < count($arrayOfStuff); $k++)
{
DoSomeStuff();
?>
document.getElementById("status").innerHTML="<?= $k/count($arrayOfStuff) ?>%";
<?
}
?>
document.getElementById("status").innerHTML = "Done";
</script>


The form.html file contains the form and the iframe. No big surprise if you've been reading this. The iframe isn't not displayed. It's just sized so that it's not huge.

The script.php file gets an array that was posted to it. It spits out an empty span tag called "status" and starts a javascript. You put the script after the span so that it'll run as the php script runs. The span is already defined, so the javascript can use it as it goes. No need to define a function at the top and call it and all kinds of nonsense.

Then it loops over the array, doing whatever it is that you need to do. Wat each iteration, you spit out a line of javascript that changes the span to reflect the percentage that's been completed (the element you're at, divided by the total). When the loop is over, you spit out a final line that changes the span to say, "done" and close the script.

The user will see the script running in the iFrame, but the form.html page will not reload. Nice, easy and clean.

Of course, this is all super simplified so that it's easy for me to explain here. My actual code has lots of extras like alert boxes on errors: if there's an error in any iteration of the script, you could print out an 'alert("errormessage")' which will display a popup.

It's not a new idea, but I just discovered it and got super excited. It worked great. Did just what I wanted. Saved me a lot of time and code. I love it.

Until next time,

~~Ben

PCI-Xpress

So, apparently, there are more than 3 types of expansion buses. Up until tonight, I was aware of only AGP, PCI, and PCI express. I am now aware of many others. You see, I've been trying to shoe horn a PVR into my main desktop and I have not been very successful as of yet.

The other day, I scored a Pinnacle HDTV card (http://www.amazon.com/Pinnacle-Systems-8230-10023-51-PCTV-Card/dp/B000X27YQI) from WOOT. At 50 bucks, it looked like a good deal. I've been wanting to make up my own PVR Media Center PC thing for a while, but never had the funds or the drive to do so. I still don't really have the funds to build a new one from scratch, so I decided to stick the HDTV card into my desktop. It fits and works great.

The problem is that I've got a TV and stereo system that would just be wasted if I started watching TV on my PC. Plus, I like using my computer while watching TV, and having an extra window sitting on top of everything gets old really quick. And also, people watch movies and stuff with me in my room, and it would be a pain for them to have to watch it on my monitor. This problem is easily remedied with a couple of cables coming off my PC and sticking into my Stereo setup.

My machine is kind of old. It came from a hospital or something where it probably operated some kind of crazy expensive piece of equipment, so it's still pretty powerful. When I got it, it had a 3GHz Xeon processor, 512MB of ram, and a sweet-ass video card with a Nvidia Quadro4 chipset. I've upgraded the ram to 2 gigs and through in a few old SCSI hard drives. It's a pretty more than decent machine for what I do. Unfortunately, it's got an integrated sound card and no TV out.

Not a problem. I hit up newegg (http://www.newegg.com/) to snag a new sound card and maybe a cheap video card with just a TV out. Before I buy anything, I check the MoBo to see what kind of expansion options I've got. It has an AGP slot that's inhabited by the sweet nvidia card. It's got two PCI slots, one of which was holding an extra ethernet card. Below those, it's got three PCI-X slots, one of which was filled with my PCHD card.

Okay, I thought. I'll get a video card that's PCI-eXpress and a soundcard that's PCI. More than enough room. So I order a cheap PCI 7.1 sound card. And I order a cheap PCI-Express video card with Nvidia chip set and a TV out. Totaled to about 60 bucks. I'm in business.

They came in today. I removed the extra ethernet card and replaced it with the sound card. Awesome. I still can't hook it to my stereo yet because of a weird grounding problem that causes a buzzing noise. That's okay, though. I'll go to radio shack and get a magical box that will eliminate the buzz.

I pull out the new video card and try to cram it in one of the PCI-X slots. It doesn't fit. I cram harder. It still doesn't fit. I took it out and look at the pins. It's obvious that the pins won't fit the slot. Weird. It says PCI-Express on the box... Maybe they mis labeled it? It looks like an AGP card. So I tried replacing my good video card with the new one. Nope. Not an AGP card. So if it's not a PCI Express card, and it's not an AGP card... and it's definitely not a PCI card... what the heck is it?

A quick googling reveals that it is indeed a PCI-Express (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PCI_Express) card. Just like I had ordered. However, PCI-Express and PCI-X are not the same thing. PCI-X (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PCIX) is more like PCI 2.0 or something. This kind of makes sense. It's a really old mobo, so it was probably made before PCI Express (PCIe) got popular. PCI-X and PCIe are not compatible.

A check of the box that my PCHD card came in reveals that it is not a PCIe card. Just a regular PCI card that can also fit in PCI-X slots. Cuz they're compatible sometimes. Or something. I don't really understand it.

The bottom line is that PCIexpress and PCI-X are not the same thing. And I've got a $30 video card that I can't use. I guess I'll try to sell it to some guys at school or try to swap it out with something else I've got around the house. If all else fails, I'll just send it back. In the end, it's just kind of a bummer.


Anyways. Until next time,

~~Ben

Captain Numbskull Lives

Today I started another page of Captain Numbskull (http://numbskull.poonheads.com/), which is a bad idea because I've got a lot of other stuff that I should be doing right now.

The good news is that page 11 (the page I'm now working on) is the start of a crazy gun fight. It's fast paced and is going to be super fun to draw, and hopefully to read.

In case you're interested, I have some sketches and concept art at my dA account (http://benabus.deviantart.com/). Don't look if you don't want anything spoiled for when I get this thing finished. Though, I'm not going to ink or color any of the pages until I've got all the pencils done. So it will probably be a while.

Until next time,

~~Ben

A Million Ukeleles

I had a relatively lame day today. I forgot my umbrella and the bottom fell out as soon as I got off the bus on campus. So, I had to take my BLAW test while completely soaking wet. Work was alright. Then I got home.

I didn't expect much except some dry trousers, but lo and behold, what did I find in the post? A small package from London. Its contents included a small pin-on button and a CD from my dear friend, M.J. Hibbett.

I had ordered Hibbett's new CD a week or so ago from his website (http://mjhibbett.tripod.com/releases/amillionukeleles.htm) and it had finally arrived. I make sure to get all of his stuff, cuz I really like it, but this one was special. It was his first proper solo album (as his previous work had been with his group, the Validators).

The first thing I noticed, even before I popped in the CD was the unique paper case that held the disc. It was hand colored with good old fashion crayons and made up like origami so that when opened, the disc popped straight up at you like a pop-up book. This amused me greatly.

With a title like "A Million Ukeleles", I was really expecting acoustic covers of Validators songs by Mark with a ukelele. This is not the case, however. It's true that the ukelele is a prominent instrument, but none of the tracks are acoustic and most are original. The one that did stand out was "Programming is the Poetry of our Time", but that had never actually been released on an album (only in the interactive bonus tracks and demos).

In general, I'd have to say that this album is a lot more laid back than his earlier Validators works. The earlier albums were an eclectic mix of hard rock, cheery folky indie, and old fashioned fun. A Million Ukeleles, is very different in tone. Probably because it does focus on the ukelele, which is reminiscent of Hawaii and other Pacific islands. While many of the songs contain electric guitar riffs and what sounds like a backing drum machine, the wispy carefree attitude permeates through out.

I can't say it's my favorite of his albums, but it's definitely a fun listen. I've only listened to it a couple of times so far and perhaps I'll change my mind after a few more. I'm a sucker for an outstanding heavy, distorted guitar riff, which this album is lacking. We'll see, though.

And I'm not saying it's bad. Far from it. I do really like it. All I'm saying is that it's not something I'd keep in my glove box to listen to when the radio sucks. If you're into softer, lighter indie sounds, however, then "A Million Ukeleles" is for you.

Cheers,

~~Ben

Benana

The Benana is an elusive, nocturnal creature. It stands about six feet tall and is identifiable by its distinctive yellow coloring and soft brown fur. Its diet consists mainly of dust bunnies and leeks, but some Benanas have been known to eat cheeseburger drippings when food is in short supply. Generally, Benanas are not aggressive, but when provoked, they will emit a high pitched shriek and expel a highly potent nerve gas from glands behind the ears.

Up until now, there has been no evidence that these creatures even exist. This evening, however, David was able to capture a few photographs of an adult Benana in its natural environment.





Beware the Benana, for they are vicious.

Until next time,

~~Ben

The Axe-Knife-Hammer

When I hear "multi-tool" I automatically think of my Leatherman. In actuality, however, a multi-tool is just about any multi-function tool. Like a Swiss-Army knife. Or a spork.

The other day, David shows me the day's deal at Tanga (http://tanga.com/). Tanga is kind of like Woot with its one-day-one-deal business model, except that it has fewer electronics and more weird stuff. On this particular day was the mother of all mult-tools.



I saw this and immediately had to own it. From the photo on Tanga all we could tell was that it had pliers, a hammer, an ax, and some swiss-army type knives. With all that, it must have been huge. Google quickly told us that similar tools were about 10 inches long. When it finally came in, we were surprised at its size.



I don't have huge hands and this thing was definitely not huge. It's a little too big to carry in one's pocket like my Leatherman, but it would fit nicely in a backpack, or a purse, or a glove box. It also came with a cheap nylon pouch that would fit on your belt if you went hiking or something. And the wooden handle inlay adds a touch of class and ruggedness to your hiking.



The most striking feature is obviously the axe-hammer on top. It's not a huge ax, but could definitely take out a small tree. The hammer would be good to hammer a tent-pole, or hang a picture, or break a window if your car is sinking in a flash flood. What might not be apparent at first glance is the pliers.



It's a pretty decent pair of lineman's pliers, complete with wire cutters. What really makes it stand out, to me, is the spring loaded handle. It's basically just a piece of metal that pushes the handle out, but it does its job well. And, it's got a really solid latch that holds it closed, so there's no worry of it coming open and pinching your balls off if you've got it in your pocket. It one-ups my leatherman in the pliers department. Of course, it doesn't JUST have an ax, a hammer, and some pliers. Like any good multi-tool, it's a got a slue other fold out tools.



I'll start at the top: A plain old straight blade. Nothing fancy, but required. Bottle Opener. Hex wrench (note the stepping... so it fits multiple sizes). Some kind of chisel, pry bar, screw driver thing. Phillips screw-driver. Saw. Serrated knife. Nail file. Flat-head screwdriver.

None of the blades lock, but it's a relatively small sacrifice, considering the the rest of the package. My favorite part is still the axe, though. There are many tools that have axes, such as survival type hatches and military entrenching tools, but how many people can say they've got an axe on their pocket knife? This is definitely the most unique knife in my collection.

I would highly recommend this tool to anybody. Even my mother was amazed by its functions. She said she uses her swiss-army knife all the time, but wishes it had a hammer. Which this sucker has. The only problem is that we got this one off of Tanga. It's kind of hard to find elsewhere. I've seen similar tools all over the internet, but nothing quite like it. Some have the axe and hammer, but not the pliers. Some have the pliers and hammer, but no axe. Others are just too expensive (we got this one at $25). So, if you can find a good deal on something like this, I'd nab it. It's just too cool.

Until next time,

~~Ben

Murder Party

This evening, I saw the best movie I've ever seen in my entire life. It's called Murder Party. (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0878695/)

We rented it on a whim for our weekly movie night. It was either this or Idiocracy. The coin told us to pick Murder Party. It was one of the best overall decisions we've ever made to date. I laugh a lot at a lot of things, but this movie, by far, has made me laugh more and harder than ever before.

It's an independent film by a group called The Lab of Madness. The cover of the DVD bares a chainsaw-wielding nerd dressed in a cardboard knight costume. The back describes it as a mix between Napoleon Dynamite and The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. I'm hear to tell you that it's far better than both.

The story follows a loser named Chris who finds an open invitation to a "Murder Party" on Halloween. He's bored and has no friends, so he decides to make a knight costume from cardboard and duct tape. Upon arriving at the old warehouse, he is assaulted and held captive by a small group of art school students who plan to murder him in the name of art.

I immediately identified with the lead character. He's lonely. He has an alarm on his watch that tells him to take his medication. And he makes stuff out of duct tape and cardboard. This is me in 5 years.

The other characters were beautifully personified. In this group of artfags, I saw the people I got to know in the college of arts, and the people I used to hang out with in high school, and the people who hang out in the honors lounge. If there was an archetype for art students, these characters would fit that perfectly.

The first half of the movie does well to set the morbidly funny tone of the film, introduce the characters and establish the plot. It also openly satirizes the pretentious, self-absorbed fakeness of the artfag community. Everything I hate about art students is openly mocked and shown in a light that I can only describe as "It's funny because it's true."

In the second half, the pace quickens and the focus switches from humor to gore. Most of the cast gets killed off in a fantastic bloodbath. Because there are fewer characters who are able to speak, the film makers are free to showcase their outstanding special effects work. The physical comedy, combined with the amazing blood and guts make-up, causes the movie to remain obscenely funny despite the waning dialog.

I wouldn't call it a horror flick, but it's not strictly a comedy. Maybe a dark comedy? Whatever it is, it blends the two genres seamlessly. The inane plot, colorful characters and fantastic gory special effects make this something special. I'll definitely be picking up a copy for my personal library. I recommend that you do the same.

Until next time,

~~Ben

P.S.: Lexi's pussy screamed at me. VAAAAAAAAAAAHHH!!!!

99 Poonanas

Lately, I've been drinking a lot of Coke Zero. It's all the Coke Taste, with none of the Coke Calories. Why? Because I've recently gained a lot of weight, and the 150ish calories I get from a can of Coke can better be used Arby's. And also because I love Coke. When I was living in my apartment, I was relatively fit and pretty much subsisted purely on Coke. And also Poon.

That's when I realized that, lately, my lack of motivation, inspiration, and energy can probably attributed to my recent lack of Poon intake. In order to remedy this, I decided to mix up a batch of my favored orange liquid. Apparently, they've reduced the amount of sugar in Tang. While this is good for my 'weight problem', it changes the Poon recipe considerably.

For those trying at home, the new Recipoon is as follows:
Get a can of Tang
Change the name on the can to "POONTang" with a Sharpie
Using a funnel, put 2 level scoops of POONTang into a 2.2 Liter PoonJug
Fill the PoonJug with tap water until almost full
Add ice until the water comes right up to the bottom of the neck of the PoonJug
Screw on the cap and shake vigorously until all the powder at the bottom of the jug has been dissolved
Enjoy

It's the first time in months that I've had some good Poon. I was happy. And then, the mostly empty bottom of 99 Bananas (http://www.bartonbrands.com/99bananas.html) that we had left over from Thomas's birthday caught my eye.

I had already taken a few long draws from my PoonJug, so I topped it off with a 2 or 3 shots of the 99 proof banana flavored schnapps. To my delight, the mixture's taste and aroma were very pleasing. The artificial banana flavoring canceled some of the tangy citrus sting and created a smooth tropical beverage. And it doesn't hurt that it's got a spike of alcohol to calm the nerves.

While 99 Poonanas will never take the place of traditional Poon, it is an excellent addition to our library of poontastic recipes. I'd like to try it with other blends (99 Apples?), but for the time being, I'll make sure to keep a bottle of 99 Bananas handy.

Until next time,

~~Ben

Cookie Duster

I'd like to say that my colloquial lexicon is larger than most but every now and then I hear something that I have honestly never heard before.

Recently, several of my coworkers discovered my Facebook profile. Generally, someone finding my Facebook is not a big deal. Unfortunately, when someone you work with finds it... things can get crazy fast. Especially when that coworker is Stephen.

The other day, I ran into him in the kitchen at work. The first thing he did was complement me on my glorious mustache. This is odd because I don't wear my mustache at work.

"What?" I asked. "Don't act like you don't know what I'm talking about" he replied. That's when I learned that he had discovered my Facebook. No big deal. Then he used a phrase that was altogether new to me. You see, Stephen comes from some crazy foreign land where they use terms that no one anywhere else on the planet uses.

Cookie Duster.

This caught me by surprise. Sure, it could mean simply that my mustache was so awesome that it dusted the tops of cookies when I ate them. But I have a dirty mind. And in my experience, Stephen also has a dirty mind. In general, everyone I work with has a dirty mind, so I guess I fit in pretty good there.

So, I got to thinking. What could "Cookie Duster" mean? Well... I have heard, on multiple occasions, the word "cookie" used to describe a vagina, not dissimilar from "cooter", "cooch", or "twat". With that in mind, "dusting a cookie" must mean something like "dusting a vagina". ... In order to dust a vagina with a mustache, one's mustache must be close to the vagina. Usually, the only time a mustache is near a vagina would be during a "mustache ride", which we all know is a euphemism for cunnilingus. It all started fitting together. Taking into account the source of the new phrase, this was the only logical explanation.

My suspicions were further qualified by a later conversation in which the size of my mustache was called into question. It was, indeed, a fine mustache. Large enough for dusting the largest of cookies. In context, it sounded a lot dirtier. Especially when followed by a description of Scott licking his eyebrows.

Of course, I could be wrong. Unlikely, though. Having such a fantastic soup strainer makes it hard to be wrong.

Until next time,

~~Ben

Dual Monitors for the Masses

Lets not beat around the bush. I'm a nerd. There's no denying it. I'm a nerd of many interests, however. Comic books, video games, TV, toys, anime, sci-fi, Star Trek, computers. Wide variety. I try to pretend I'm not, but I am. I geek out about things that most people would find excessive or boring or stupid.

One of the things I geek out about is my home computer. I want the fastest and the biggest. I don't do any read computing on my home PC but that doesn't stop me from bragging about my 3Ghz Xeon or the 2gigs of memory. I know that compared to some, that's nothing, but it makes me smile.

In the web-design industry, one of the things that people most frequently geek out about is the monitor. At work, they got me a new monitor to replace the tiny old one that I was using before. It was the biggest among the programmers and everyone ooooed and aaaahed. In the grand scheme of things, my single huge WSXGA+ was canceled out by the other guys' multi-monitor setups. Having a huge one is great, but having several is better. Scott Adams wrote a Dilbert strip about it today (http://dilbert.com/comics/dilbert/archive/dilbert-20071016.html).

At home, I used to have a 21-inch Dell Trinitron CRT. That sucker was great. It let me pull off 1600x1200 (UXGA) at 85Hz. A high refresh rate is important to me because if it's set too low, the flicker gives me migraines. Unfortunately, Dell Trinitrons had a defect where one of the resistors goes out and the pictures goes way too bright. Glenn and I managed to patch it with a little solder, but it eventually gave out. I had to down grade to a 19inch we had lying around. Luckily, it also let me have UXGA at 85Hz. Unluckily, it suffered the same defect and eventually crapped out.

Needless to say, I needed to get a new monitor. By this time I had grown accustomed to the obscenely large resolution. You see, a high resolution lets you have multiple windows open and lets you spread out some. This increases productivity greatly. I'm not too productive at home, but I was still compelled to use a high resolution, as smaller ones feel cramped and uncomfortable (like downgrading from a Buick to a Civic). I finally settled on a 22 inch ViewSonic. It natively supports UXGA (which means there's actually 1,920,000 pixels on the screen) and since it's an LCD, I don't have to worry about the refresh rate (I'm not going to go into this, but suffice to say that LCD's don't work the same as CRT's). I was happy.

Last weekend, my mom brought home a ViewSonic CRT that they were throwing away at work. Of course, with an extra monitor in the house, I couldn't help but try to set up a multi-monitor setup in my room. I managed to acquire an NVIDIA Quadro4 750 graphics card which allowed me to plug my LCD into its DVI-D port while at the same time plugging the new CRT into its VGA port. Cake. So, now I've got my main LCD at 1600x1200 and my CRT at 1024x768 (the highest resolution it could pull off at 85Hz) which brings my total pixel width to 2624. That's pretty awesome, though we'll have to see what happens when I get my PCHDTV tuner card in and have to rig up some way to get my computer to hook up to my TV.

Now, this isn't my first foray into the multi-monitor world. About this time last year, I was able to nab an old generic laptop for $200 off of e-bay. I also had this extra PC set up (with its own monitor and keyboard) off to the side where I could play with SQL Server. A while back, I stumbled over an amazing piece of software while googling mult-monitor setups. It is called MaxiVista (http://www.maxivista.com/). It allows you to use the monitors of networked PCs as extensions of your main PC's monitor, essentially emulating a PC with a dual-monitor video card. In addition, if you wanted, you could use it to remotely control the networked PC instead of using it to extend the desktop (like an awesome KVM [KeyboardVideoMouse] switch, without the monitor part). This let me use the laptop to run e-mail and AIM on its processor while I used my main PC to run Photoshop on its processor, both using the same keyboard and mouse, and at the same time I could let my SQL Server run in the background doing its own thing while I used its monitor the extend my main PC's desktop.

It was a super awesome setup. I have a stereo pic of it (http://www.poonheads.com/mUpload/images/200710162234124.jpg) but I won't post it here because it's kind of big. In the end, however, I was left with only my Dell because my laptop died and I had to return the server, as it was on loan. It was fun while it lasted.

So, this morning, I got to campus at 9:30AM where I realized that Maples had canceled class. I had forgotten because I am a dumbass. Since I had another class later that day, I decided to stay on class and fool around in the computer lab while my classmates studied for their 470 exam. The room was relatively empty and I was the only person seated at a row of 4 PCs. With 4 monitors (one for each PC) lined up nicely on the desk.

That's when it struck me. I was bored and had a room full of computers at my disposal, specifically, a row of 4 unused computers with nice monitors. I knew for a fact that this particular lab was all networked together and behind a firewall because I had assisted in its networking last semester. With this setup, it would be VERY easy to set up MaxiVista in this room.

I installed the server software for the main machine on the second machine from the aisle. That way, I could have the main monitor and one on each side. I didn't want to be too greedy and use the 4th, mainly because it would be too much trouble (MaxiVista DOES support up to 4 monitors on a single server). I set everything up and it worked like a charm. I didn't think it would hurt anything because this particular lab was utilized almost exclusively for MIS classes, meaning that it would mostly be people learning Visio and Project, SQL Server and Visual Studio.

Visual Studio is what I planned on using the most here. The one thing that always aggravated me was not being able to spread out when using Visual Studio in this lab. It was filled with monitors that sported either SXGA or, because of some misinstalled drivers, XGA resolutions. Now that I had installed MaxiVista, however, I would be free to spread out as much as I wanted. A total of 3328 pixels across. I could use one screen for the main design/code window, the left screen for the properties, tools, solution and server explorer windows, and the right screen for the browser.

I was in desktop real-estate paradise. Even though few of my colleagues were impressed, in my mind I had racked up some serious geek points. I think I'll go in early on Thursday to install the 4th client on the teacher's machine which is connected to the overhead projector. Sure, it's only SVGA (800x600), but how cool would it be to have a 4th monitor that's 6 feet across to act as a heads up display?

In short, having an obscene amount of desktop real estate will change your life. Once you try it, you won't be able to go back. Whether you us one huge single monitor or multiple smaller monitors (or multiple huge monitors, which can get really pricey), it doesn't matter. With more room to spread out, you'll instantly be more productive because you won't have to switch between windows. It's essential if you're a designer or coder or other serious computer user, but it's still really fun if you're just a web surfer.

I'll leave you with this tip: If you do end up using a setup with a higher resolution, DO NOT maximize your windows. They put things in separate windows so that you can open many of them at the same time. Try putting them side-by-side. It lets you view many things at once and makes switching between browser windows, word documents, and other applications, a lot faster than having to navigate to the task bar every ten seconds. You have all this extra room... USE IT. It's kind of like a Buffet line. You don't want to cover your whole plate in just Seseme chicken. You'll want to have some low mein and egg rolls and maybe some fried rice as well. If it's a really small plate, try using two or three. Same effect, just harder to carry. And then the old Chinese lady will yell at you when you drop one of them on the floor and she has to clean it up.

Until next time,

~~Ben

P.S. I use Windows XP in a custom box. I don't know if MaxiVista works in Linux or MacOS, nor do I care. I'm 100% positive that you can have multi-monitor support in both, but I don't know how, and again: I don't care.

Facebook Graffiti

I like Facebook. I like it a lot because it lets me keep in touch with my friends. Some people would argue that MySpace does the same sort of thing. But I hate MySpace with a passion. Mostly because of the customization it allows.

While MySpace allows you to customize your profile to the point that it is completely unreadable, Facebook does not allow such nonsense. It keeps the appealing light blue layouts consistent between all the profiles. This makes sure that everyone can easily access the information held within its pages. In order to socially network, you need to be able to actually read the information that your friends provide.

When I learned that Facebook would begin allowing customizations in the form of 'apps', I was completely against them on principle. I was not and am not unfounded in my criticism. I'm already seeing profiles cluttered beyond recognition with useless and stupid apps, some of which do nothing more than randomly generate a quote that no one bothers to read or captures innocent victim in pyramid-scheme-like games. It saddens me that such a great thing could fall so hard.

I'll be honest. I have installed a couple of applications. The ones I have are simple and unobtrusive. They enhance, not hinder. One is the Top Friends app which I use to quickly access my small group of friends whose profiles I frequent. The other is the Graffit-Wall. It lets me draw pictures.

This Graffiti App (http://apps.facebook.com/graffitiwall/) is more useful and more fun than some of the built-in features (read: Poke). WIth Graffiti, I can draw horrifying pictures on my friends profiles. Pictures of fruitcocks, zombies and balls. Things that plain text just can't convey. It's fun. There's nothing better than running into someone whose first words are "Wow. That Cactus with testicles you drew on my Facebook... Just amazing."

Graffiti gets a thumbs up from me. Everyone needs to install it. And then draw pictures of inanimate objects with genitalia on my wall.

Until next time,

~~Ben

RSS News Reader

A long time ago, there was a TV network called Tech TV. It had cool shows about technology type stuff. It was probably my favorite television network ever.

Then it got bought out by G4, the gaming network. Now owned by G4, all the tech shows started getting replaced by gamer oriented shows. All the great tech show hosts got laid off in favor of hip, stylish gamer hosts. Lame.

Kevin Rose, one of the younger, hipper tech show hosts got sick of the G4 and, with the help of his partner in crime, Dan Huard, started his own Internet TV station thing (http://www.revision3.com/). They have all kinds of awesome tech related shows, just like they had on Tech TV, except I dont' have to get extended cable to watch them.

I hadn't kept up with any of these shows since The Broken went on hiatus. Today, I decided to look it up and realized that I don't have the time to watch all the back episodes like I wanted. I figured instead of trying to watch all the ones that were already up, I'd do better to just watch the new ones as they come out. To do this, I would need a feed and a reader.

RSS feeds make it easy to keep up to date on news and site updates. I've got one for this blog (the orange icon in the menu bar). Revision3 has one for each of its shows. In order to take advantage of an RSS feed, however, you really need a feed Reader to aggregate all your feeds and keep you updated on them.

Mozilla Thunderbird (http://www.mozilla.com/en-US/thunderbird/), the email client that I use, has a built in News reader, so I figured I would just use that one. I went in and subscribed to all the feeds and everything looked peachy. Thunderbird, unfortunately, was built to be an email client first and foremost. It's news reading capabilities are kind of iffy. I'm all a fan of simple, but there comes a point when something just doesn't do what I need it to do. Thunderbird did not do what I needed it to do.

The main problem was that after subscribing to all of the feeds for all of the Revision3 shows, I found that there were almost 300 new articles in all those subscriptions. Not that bad, I thought, because I had just subscribed to them. They were all new to me. What I didn't know was that Thunderbird would pull down ALL the articles EVERY time it updated. So, after clicking the Get Mail button two or three time, I ended up with something like 800 new articles, most of which were duplicates. This would not do.

A quick Googling led me to Sharp Reader (http://www.sharpreader.net/). I've only used it for about an hour, but already I like it. It's everything I wanted. Simple, only pulls down updates and opens articles in an external browser. What more could I want? Perhaps more awesome news feeds to read in my new news reader? Probably.

While Thunderbird is a great email client, I would not suggest it as a news reader. Sharp Reader, however, I would throughly recommend for a News Reader. If you do a lot of newsing, I mean.

Until next time,

~~Ben

Codename: Gung Ho

When I was a kid I played with action figures. I had a lot of them. As I got older, I stopped playing and took to collecting them. During high school, I almost exclusively collected anime characters and things with chainsaws. When I started college, I pretty much gave it up because I had better things to do and no good place to display my collection.

Last Christmas, I got a glass display case where I was able to display all the figures I had boxed up for the past few years. I hadn't really bought anything new, save a couple of Final Fantasy figures when Advent Children had come out.

Lately, though... There's been something wrong with me. I find myself heading to the toy aisle every time I go to Wal-mart or Target. I blame David Willis (http://www.shortpacked.com/). But say la vee, as they say.

Why am I telling you this? Well, I thought it might be a good idea to give a little background before I start telling you about my latest purchase: G.I. Joe's Gung Ho.

In the past there were two kind of GI Joes... The 3.5 inch ones and the 12 inch ones. Over the past couple of years, starting with the Sigma 6 line, they've started making 8 inch scale figures. This is awesome because it's like a middle ground. They're not super tiny, but they're not super big. They're a little cartoony looking, but I think that's one of the reasons I like them.

I've been wanting to get one for a while, but never could bring myself to do it for one reason or the other. Then they came out with Gung Ho, who, as we all know, is super awesome. He's a marine, and he doesn't wear a shirt, and he has a sweet mustache. This particular version doesn't go shirtless, but he's still awesome. Just look at that mustache:



Tell me that's a not mug to fall in love with.

As a toy, this is a pretty great figure. He's jointed in all the right areas, so he can assume tons of poses. He's got big huge feet that are jointed at the ankle which allow him to stand easily and remain very stable, even while he's carrying his huge-ass gun.



He came equipped with a machine gun, a removable helmet, a knife and sheath, a belt, body armor, and a hugely useless 'multi-tool'. It's this huge thing as big as the figure with foldable tools including an axe, a knife, a shovel and an awl. They could have given him a machete, or a backpack or something, but instead they give him a stupid multi-tool. It's not much of a gimmick. The machine gun's gimmick isn't much better. You pull the ammo strip through the gun and the barrel moves back and forth. Laa-aame. I have to say, though... His Kung-Fu grip makes up for it.



People always talk about G.I. Joes and the Kung-Fu grip. I've never seen one with any kind of kung-fu grip. Upon wikipedia-ing it, I learned that, originally, Kung-Fu grip was just a rubber hand which made it easier to hold his guns and stuff. Now, it's a hand with spring loaded fingers which makes it easier to crush your opponents into diamonds, like Superman. It makes me happy. I can now say that I've got the G.I. Joe with The Kung Fu Grip.

The only thing I don't like about my Gung-Ho is that he's got hair. Under his detachable helmet he has a dark brown buzz cut. Gung Ho is supposed to be super bald, which added to his characters. But, as long as I keep his helmet on, I can pretend.

In the end, it was a satisfying purchase and, at $10, I feel no buyer's remorse. Sure, in my day, a GI Joe should have costed 3 or 4 dollars, but with inflation, I figure 10 bucks is a pretty good buy these days. I'll probably buy another if I see one that strikes my fancy. Or if they make one of Scarlett (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scarlett_%28G.I._Joe%29).

Until next time...

~~Ben

The Poonheads Short Film

David is an English major. He writes stuff. He used to write plays. Now he just writes creatively. This semester he's in a Screen Writing class.

His latest assignment was to eves drop on a conversation and using that bit of dialog, write a short film that is completely unrelated to it. This is relevant because he eves dropped on me and Thomas and used that dialog to create a Poonheads Short Film.

As you may or may not know, Poonheads came into being because of an idea we had for a movie. That idea has long since been scrapped, but it's interesting to see another movie version take shape.

The plot revolves around our three comic heroes Ben, Pillboy, and Sterling. After a short conversation on the Ugly Pink Couch, we discover that Sterling has a big date tonight. The film cuts to tonight where Sterling and his date are trying to have dinner. Attached to Sterling's forehead is a camera and in his ear, a radio transceiver. Both are transmitting to a van parked down the street. In the van, Ben and Pillboy attempt to coach their friend through his date. Hilarity ensues.

Sure, the whole Cyrano de Bergerac shtick has been done to death, but David manages to breathe new life into in true Poonheads fashion. I nearly lost my shit when I read it.

Unfortunately, there is no actual movie yet. It's just an 8 page screen play draft. David says that his instructor will choose one screenplay from his class to produce next semester in a Production class. I would love to see this be made into a movie. I would especially love to see it be acted by actors other than ourselves. It would be really funny.

And if it doesn't get made, I would have no objection to taking on the task myself. it's short and seems like it would be fairly easy to produce, given that we can find a pretty girl to play Sterling's date.

Also, it's tentatively titled "The Poonheads Get Some". The title alone should make you want to see it. And if it doesn't, it's probably because you suck.

Until next time,

~~Ben

P.S. Kitten: (http://gigglesugar.com/682002)

Guitar for the Soul

It may come as a surprise to some that I play guitar. I would think, anyways. I guess when I look at myself in the mirror I just don't see a guitar player.

I'm not super good. But I'm not super bad, either. I just play for fun. For myself. It's the one thing that I doubt will ever have a chance of becoming a chore.

Unlike comicking, guitar playing doesn't take any set up. When drawing, I have to take out my paper and pencils and erasers and stuff. With my guitar I just reach over, grab the sucker and start playing. I'm able to be creative. I create something that will not have to be cleaned up or stored away.

It's not like coding in that I don't have to think about it. Coding requires analytical thinking. Guitar playing is mostly muscle memory. Yet, it's not passive like watching TV or listening to music. When I'm sitting there, I'm actually moving my fingers. I'm an active participant. I find guitar playing to be very satisfying.

It's kind of like meditating. I can just sit back and relax, sometimes not think about anything, sometimes think about everything. But I'm able to focus because my hands are busy with the strumming and the fretting. I find it difficult to talk while I'm playing, but I think about all kinds of things.

Music making is good for the soul. When I come home, no matter how hard of a day I've had, or how tired I may be, there's always enough left in me to pick up my Strat and finger a tune. It clears my head and revitalizes me, if only for a moment.

I would highly recommend taking up a musical instrument. Something that's easy to start, but complex enough to keep you from getting bored. Portability is another consideration. A guitar isn't that portable, but I stay in my room a lot. I've been known to take a harmonica with my on trips, though. So, maybe something like that.

Start off slow and don't get frustrated. Remember, you're doing it for fun. If you get angry with it, it won't help soothe anything, especially not the soul. Just screw around with it, making sounds that appeal to you. Doesn't matter if it makes a song or not. Eventually, if you like the instrument, you'll get bored with just making noise and try to learn a song or two. Don't get frustrated if you can't get them right away. Just set it down and come back later. Remember that you're playing for fun. I've been playing for around 7 years now, and I don't know more than 10 songs total. But it's still fun.

One other thing to consider is the people you live with. Don't play so loudly that you bother everyone around you. They'll just come in and bitch you out and that's no fun. So, keep it respectable. That's why I don't use an amp (http://youtube.com/watch?v=ZovZ6phyXSo).

And if it turns out that music's just not your thing... well, I'm sure there's something else out there that could help you relax. Maybe yoga. Or a bonsai tree. All I know is that my guitar is important to my own mental well-being, so it might be of some help to yours.

Until next time,

~~Ben

It's Timex to Party

I'm a nerd for gear. I like being prepared. Like a boyscout without the gay part. The chances of finding myself in a true survival situation is slim to none, but I still get a kick out of it.

Up until recently, I've been known for carrying way more gear than I need at all times. I blame Sean Kennedy (http://patrolling.rantmedia.ca/). He changed my life, but I'm not sure if it's for the better. For a while I was carrying obscene amounts of gear including, but not limited to, a knife, a lighter, a multi-tool, a flashlight, USB thumbdrives, keys, a P-38 can opener (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/P-38_can_opener), copious amounts of 550 paracord, carabiners, another knife on my keychain, my cellphone, my wallet, a small notepad, and a small pencil.

I got a lot of strange looks. So I decided to stream line. I still carry tons of stuff, but most of it is integrated with my bag (which is a surplus rucksack that's been modified beyond recognition). Nowadays, when I'm not with my bag, I typically keep just the necessities with me: My tan hat, my Leatherman Wave (http://leatherman.com/products/tools/wave/default.asp), my phone, keychain, wallet, paracord and carabiners (with which I tether my phone, keys, and wallet to my belt), business cards, and notpad.

There are only two items, however, that I only take off when I shower: My watch and my dog tags.

Today, I'm going to talk about my watch. It's a Timex Expedition T478719J (http://www.timex.com/gp/product/B0000TIJ40). It's been a really great watch. So much so that I've actually owned two of them. I had the first one for years until I cracked the glass and couldn't read it anymore. I forget where I got it originally, but I got the new one at Wal-mart for about 25 bucks.

I always thought it was black, but I've recently learned it's blue. Apparently, I'm colorblind.

This watch does everything I could ever want and more. I use most of the functions (other than the chronograph/stop watch) very regularly. In addition to telling the time, it's equipped with a timer, 3 alarms (which can all be set to either weekends, weekdays, or daily), a date function (with day of the week, month and day), two time zones, and 24-hour time. My favorite feature is the way you set the clock (or alarms). It's got two buttons, one for going forward and one for going back. So, if you're setting the alarm and you accidentally skip past the minute you wanted, you don't have go all the way around again; just go back one. And the AM/PM is set separately from the hour, which makes it so easy to set.

And the face has Indiglo (a light). I find this very useful. Just hit the button and the face lights up for a couple of seconds. It's very easy for me to bash the button against my forehead and turn it on with just one hand. And it's really bright, so I can use it to find the keyhole when I'm coming in late at night. It's also got a night setting for when you're on night missions and need to set the timer or alarms or use the stopwatch at night. Hold down the indiglo button for a few seconds to turn it on. Then, pushing any of the buttons will keep the light on.

The band isn't super great, but it does the job. On my first watch I had to replace the band a couple of times. I don't really like the leather/suade/cloth combination. When I had to replace it, I switched to a plain old black nylon strap. I prefer function over form and like for things to stand out as little as possible. For a while I was using one of those velcro straps, but it was way loud, got caught on stuff and started to smell funky after a while. I much prefer the nylon one that I switched it out with. I'll probably get that kind when the OEM band wears out.

I recently scuffed the face, which makes me sad. One of these days when I get some time, I'll have to buff it out. I can't imagine it being too difficult.

In summary, it's a really sweet watch that lives up to it's brand. I'll happily replace this one with another of the same model when the time comes. I would recommend this watch to anyone who needs to know exactly when it's time to party.

Until next time,

~~Ben

Keyboard

After a while of using the same keyboard in an area where you do other stuff like eating and drinking and carpentry, you'll find that the keys become a little sticky because of the crust that forms in the tray under all the keys. And, even thought you might dust and keep clean your desk, you'll notice that dust builds up (along with missing pens and rubber bands) underneath the keyboard. This happened to me a while back.

I decided that my keyboard needed a make-over. The first thing I tried to do was clean up the key-crust. To start this operation, I first had to pop off all the keys. This was easily taken care of with the aid of a pocket knife. I was able to use a toothbrush and some compressed air to clean the tray and all the keys.

While I was at it, I created a skirt with duct tape. The skirt would drape around the edges of the keyboard, touching the desk so that dust and pens and crap could not get under the keyboard and leave a disgusting surprise for me the next time I tried to clean my desk.

It wasn't until I had turned my computer on and reattached all the keys that I had realized what I had done. The space bar didn't work.

Actually, it did, just not correctly. See, all the keys are attached to the board via one little post in the center of the key. All the normal keys are so small that the one post is sufficient. Larger keys, like the Enter, Shift, and Space bar, require assistance. Without the aid of a metal bent-paperclip-looking thing, if you push down one side, the other side comes up, like a see-saw pivoting on the center post. Because of this pivoting action, the post is never depressed and the keystroke does not register.

My space bar's paper-clip thing had broken during the cleaning. Over the next few months I would try to repair it with hot glue, paper clips, duct tape and all sorts of other things, never to any success. It was really getting on my nerves because sometimes it just wouldn't register, and other times it would stick and I'd have to pry it back up.

Today, after a couple of hours of work with some cardstock and hot glue, I managed to fix the issue. My space bar is now wonderfully responsive and makes typing a pleasure.

Yeah, I could have gotten another keyboard. In fact, I have a lot of other keyboards. I just like this one. It's got a row of hotkeys which are super useful for volume control and Hibernation. I picked up a replacement keyboard at Office Depot, but it didn't feature the Sleep key, which I use at least once ever day. So I returned it, getting back my 14 dollars (which was a rip-off to begin with... the one I've got costed $10.) I figured after enough time, I'd figure out a way to adequately repair the afflicted key.

Which I did. And now I'm happy.

Until next time...

~~Ben

Beer + Mustaches

Today was a rather eventful day. More eventful than most days. I woke up around 2PM because it's Saturday and I like to get a lot of sleep on Saturdays. I ate a bit of food, drank a coke and worked on a paper.

After the paper was done, David and I decided to go get some food. We called up Tombo to see if he wanted to come with us. By 7, David, Thomas, James and I were at Buffet City eating way too much. Let me tell you something. Mongolian Grill is the shit. It's like low mein, except you get to pick what you want in it. And it's super awesome. So that's what I ate. I highly recommend it to anyone.

Back at Thomas's place, we looked at some of his sweet comic strips. They're top secret, but with any luck, will be published in the school paper next semester. At which time, everyone will explode due to their sheer awesomeness.

A little later, we rented Beerfest. It's by Broken Lizard, the same guys who made Super Troopers. It was super funny. It wouldn't have been quite as funny had we not stopped by Albertson's for a couple of six packs.

I don't drink much. I can count on one hand the number of times I've been drunk. Recently, however, we've decided that a good time can be had of a good movie and a few brewskies. We don't drink heavily and it's not to get drunk, so we always make it a point to try different brands and styles of beer. Tonight's selection featured some Portuguese beer and six pack of Dixie Beer.

Again, I don't drink much. I don't know much about beer. I do know what I like. I like Dixie Beer. It's definitely one of my all time favorites. I don't even really know at all where to begin describing a beer, so suffice to say that it is really good, and I'd probably buy it again.

After the movie, we decided to take a drive. "Don't drink and Drive, Ben!" Yeah, yeah.. I know. But I wasn't even buzzing. I'm a big guy and it was on a full stomach. I know when I'm not fit to drive because I'm usually not fit to drive, but do it anyway. Tonight I was definitely okay to drive.

Looking for something interesting to do, we stopped at the Park. I've heard stories that gay, sex-crazed zombies live in the park and like to rape innocent pedestrians at night, but David assured me that this was false. We took a lap around the pond and, sure enough, saw not one single zombie. Oh well. We did, however, happen upon a small group of African American youths with baseball bats. David, the largest and drunkest of us, was super tense and ready for a fight. The black guys were busy drinking some vodka and joking with their girls and didn't bother us as we calmly walked past. Good thing, too. As big and scary as David is, there's no way we could have taken on a couple of bats.

Leaving the park, we drove around for a bit and landed at the 24hr Wal-Mart for some soda because we were a bit parched from the clammy, heat of the South Louisiana night. In the parking lot, looking for a place to park, we drove past a couple knocking boots on the hood of their car. Stunned, we circled a few times, just to make sure we saw what we thought we saw. And we did. But we were thirsty, and headed inside.

Normally, we'd walk around the store for a while, killing time, but this particular night, all we wanted was a soda. So we mostly hung out by the vending machines at the entrance. It's probably the only place in America where you can get a coke for 25 cents. It's awesome.

While we chilled, a black guy came up and asked if we knew the number of a towing company. We expected that he was a hobo looking for a hand out. But he assured us that he worked off-shore and just got back. He's pretty well-off and this is the first time in years that his truck had broken down. We also learned that he and his family were from Jeanerette and that they'd be moving pretty soon because it's a bad neighborhood and he doesn't want his kids to get shot while playing in the yard. He bid us adieu and left as quickly as he had come.

It does my heart good to meet a good guy like that who doesn't want anything and is embarrassed to even ask a favor. It does my heart wrong to see the list of missing children on the bulletin board by the door. I figure at least a few of those kids just ran away. The majority probably were taken against their will. Including the 49 year old in the top right corner who I joked about, causing the girl working the door to reprimand me.

After failing at the crane game, we looked over to the quarter machines. You know... those vending machines with the cheap little toys? The Japs have the Gashapon machines with high quality stuff, and we get the ones with the cheap plastic whistles and temporary tattoos.

This one, however, had a thing of beauty. A mustache. Of coarse, seeing the furry prize, Thomas had to give it a go. "Dude, don't waste your money, what are the chances of you getting one?" And, of course, he did. It was a fetching, raven haired handle bar which was easily applied to his upper lip thanks to its adhesive backing. If only we could grow real ones as glorious.

The night drew to a close. Before heading home, we stopped in at the free carwash to try and get David's truck washed. It's not really free. We just discovered a bug in the payment system and exploit it. You're supposed to put your money in, receive a ticket and then punch in that ticket on the keypad. The ticket number isn't really important because, in reality, you can punch in any 5 digit number and it will work just fine. Unfortunately, the machine had been fixed and David's truck remains dirty.

After that let down, we decided to call it a night. It was 2AM and it had been a long evening. There would be other nights for other adventures and this night had come to an end.

Until next time,

~~Ben

MySQL Date Manipulation

At school, we use Windows boxes with .Net 2.0 and MS SQL Server. That's what we learned in class. .Net and SQL Server. The server that Poonheads.com is hosted on is a Windows box with .Net 2.0 and SQL Server. I used C#.Net to program most of the applications that run on Poonheads. I like using Visual Studio and .Net and SQL Server.

At work, we use LAMPs. Linux, Apache, MySQL, and PHP. Needless to say, that is not a Windows box with .Net and SQL Server.

Not saying I hate it. I actually like PHP. That's what I used in highschool and that's what powered the first few versions of Poonheads. It's just that development takes longer, as it doesn't have a sweet IDE with a drag and drop interface.

And also, I'm not certified in MySQL. Sure, a lot of things carry over. SQL is SQL, after all. Unfortunately, a lot of the awesome stuff I learned to do with my SQL Server certification, I can't do with MySQL. Mostly because the version we use is super old. If I could use subqueries, that would be one thing... but no. It makes my life a little more difficult.

So, I started a big new top secret project today. It's not a super complicated database. I've got start date and a duration. Two different tables. What I need is an end date. Doesn't sound to difficult. Just add the duration to the start date. But what you may not think about at first is that you need to take into account the variation in the days in a month, and what if it goes into the next year? And what about leap year?

Well, all these things make getting that end date a little more difficult. Luckily, PHP has some built in functions that make dealing with dates a lot easier. What I came up with looked something like this:
//get the start date
$query = "SELECT startdate FROM someTable";
$result = mysql_query($query);
$row = mysql_fetch_object($result);
$startdate = $row->startdate;

//get the duration
$query = "SELECT duration FROM otherTable";
$result = mysql_query($query);
$row = mysql_fetch_object($result);
$startdate = $row->duration;

//get the end date
$endDate = strtotime($enddate." + ".$duration." days");

Now, the actual code was a bit more complex, but that's basically it. It may not look like a big deal, but it's very clunky. Especially if you have to do it a hundred times (once for each row). If you're crafty, you'd be able to shrink it up with a JOIN, which would make it easier when you start having to loop through the whole list:

$query = "SELECT a.startdate, b.duration FROM someTable a LEFT JOIN otherTable b ON(a.ID = b.ID)";
$result = mysql_query($query);
while($row = mysql_fetch_object($result))
$endDate = strtotime($row->startdate." + ".$row->duration." days");

Simplifies things a bit. It's sleeker... more elegant, if you will. But it's still not what I want. It works, but because the $endDate is outside the query, I can't throw in an ORDER BY and have it order the results by the end date. In order to order the results, I'd have to stick everything in an array, then sort the array using some custom compare function. That's a lot of work. If I could get MySQL to do everything for me, that would be great. If I could get something like "SELECT (a.startdate + b.duration) AS endDate FROM ... I would be in business. Unfortunately, that doesn't work.

That's when I discovered this article: http://www.devshed.com/c/a/MySQL/Date-Arithmetic-With-MySQL/ . Thanks to these guys, I came up with this:
$query = "SELECT FROM_DAYS(TO_DAYS(a.startdate) + b.duration) AS endDate FROM someTable a LEFT JOIN otherTable b ON(a.ID = b.ID) ORDER BY endDate";
$result = mysql_query($query);
while($row = mysql_fetch_object($result))
$endDate = $row->endDate;

That makes MySQL do all the heavy lifting. A lot easier than the insanity that would have been produced if I tried to come up with some crazy array sorting algorithm. The code in this post hasn't been tested, but the code I used in the project worked like a charm. I was pretty happy with myself. So happy, in fact, that I decided to treat myself and go home at quitting time.

Until next time,

~~Ben

The Knife Collector

I like knives. I've been attracted to knives since I was a kid. There's just something about them that appeals to me.

I suppose it could be argued that it's some kind of latent homosexual tendency because of the phallic nature of the knife, but that argument could be made for a lot of things. I think it's more of a nerd thing rather than a gay thing. It would be one thing if I were a hunter who hunted and stuff, but I'm not. So it must be because I'm a nerd. For some reason, nerds tend to be attracted to knives and swords and guns. Nobody really knows why.

I feel so ashamed when I walk past the knife case at Wal-Mart or Academy and pause for a minute to look at the new Bucks. I try my hardest to be non-nerd in public, but it's so difficult sometimes. It's embarrassing, but sometimes you just can't hide who your are.

So, why knives over guns or leather thongs? Sure. As weapons, they're not as effective as guns, but I can't say I've ever been in a gun fight. Guns, however, are illegal in Russian knife fights, so I'd say it evens out. And leather thongs tend to make my balls hurt. I think the thing I like most about knives is the utility. You can do lots of things with knives. Like cut things. And if it's a Swiss-Army knife, you can uncork wine bottles. But mainly, you can cut things.

So, anyway. I like knives. I own a lot of knives. I have big knives and small knives. Some of them were really expensive. Others... not so much. In fact, out of all the knives I own, the one I use the most is a cheap, single blade tactical folder.

It's about 4 inches closed, 7 inches open. It's mostly stainless steel with cheap plastic grips glued onto the sides. It's got a pocket clip on the backside, which I never use because it sits on my desk where I'll always know where it is. The thumb post (which can be changed around for left-handed use) allows for one-handed opening, but I've loosened the action so that I can flick it open rather easily without using the thumb-post. It's a locking blade, but it won't lock unless I flick it open real hard. The clip point blade is partially serrated which makes cutting through cardboard really easy.

I mostly use it as a letter opener, but it lends itself to general desk type cutting. It cuts tape, sharpens pencils, opens packages and cleans fingernails. In a pinch, I suppose I could kill a bear with it, but I rarely get attacked by bears. And I've got other knives that would be better suited for that purpose, anyway. Also, it gives me something to play with while I thinking of something to write about.

So, it's not a super good knife (it's not even very sharp), but I like it. I'd probably be lost without it and if ever it gets lost in my seat cushion or under my keyboard, I would probably cry.

I've said all I can say about this particular knife. I have others, though. I'll probably discuss the rest of my collection in more detail in the future because coming up with new and exciting things to write about ever day is really tough. Regular features make my life a lot easier. So, look forward to future knife write ups.

Until next time,

~~Ben

Hershey's Chocolate Syrup Cap

Hershey's Chocolate Syrup is a pretty amazing thing. As someone who enjoys chocolate very much, I know this from experience. You can put it on just about anything. Or everything. Very few things can boast of this ability. Honey and Cheese are the only other two that I can think of off the top of my head. Neither of those, however, contain chocolate.

I put chocolate syrup on all sorts of things. I've been known to put it on cereal in the morning. On waffles. Toast. Ice cream. I put it in Coke. And everyone puts it in milk. As far as chocolate milk goes, the only thing that could even try to rival Hershey's syrup is Nestle's Quick. They don't have to be mutually exclusive, however. You can use both. And they're in separate leagues all together... one's a syrup and the other a powder.

Apart from the temptation to drink straight from the bottle, there's only one negative to be found with chocolate syrup:

The Cap.

As long as I can remember, chocolate syrup came in a curved brown bottle with a white and black pull top with a clear lid. Much like a sports bottle. Or a Poon Jug, for that matter. There is no good reason that this type of cap should have ever graced the top of a Hershey's bottle.

There are many methods for dealing with this type of cap in relation to Hershey's bottles. One method is to do as you would with a sports bottle. Pop off the clear lid stick the cap in your mouth and pull it open with your teeth. This is good if you live alone or enjoy drinking it straight. It's not so good for anything else.

My preferred method is as follows:


1) Remove the bottle from the fridge.
2) Remove the clear lid and place it on the counter. After several uses, the rim of the cap will be covered in chocolate and will leave a delicious brown ring on the counter top.
3) Grip the brown top with thumb and index finger.
4) Pull up, opening the cap.
5) Lick up all the syrup that is now covering your fingers from opening the cap.
6) Apply syrup to its destination.
7) Replace clear cap.
8) Put bottle on counter top.
9) Smack top of clear lid, which pushes down the brown cap, closing the bottle, while at the same time smears excess syrup all over the inside of the cap.
10) Return to fridge.

This is super messy.

A couple of months ago, I went to the fridge to fetch my Hershey's syrup when I discovered that all of these issues had been solved in a brand new high-tech cap design (http://www.hersheys.com/syrupcap/capology.aspx) . I was elated. With this new cap design, the efficiency my syruping process was greatly improved:


1) Remove bottle from fridge
2) Flip open cap
3) Pour syrup
4) Close cap
5) Return to fridge

No mess. No wasted effort. No wasted chocolate. One less thing for me to lose sleep over.

Weeks later, I returned to the fridge for another round of syrupy goodness. The previous bottle had been emptied and in its place was a brand new, freshly opened bottle. With the old cap design. My heart dropped. My hands trembled as I reached for the antiquated receptacle.

Why and how could they return to such an inefficient piece of garbage when the benefits of the new cap were so obvious? I poured my syrup and stirred my chocolate milk. I replaced the bottle and walked through the living room, pausing for a moment, looking into my cup.

"If I ever find the guy who changed the Hershey's cap back to the old style, I'll kill him. Mark my words."

Glenn looked up at me and said, "What the hell are you talking about?" I retold the story of chocolaty horror, to which he replied, "That's probably just an old bottle that we found in the back of the cabinet.

I was visibly relieved. The R&D department at Hershey's was saved for the moment. No one would have to die today. The world made sense again. If only for a little while.

Until next time,

~~Ben

Blogger Hack

Yesterday, while making my daily post here, I realized one thing that my custom news poster has over Blogger: I can make custom tags. My news poster lets me put [URL]http://www.poonheads.com[/URL] and automatically makes it into a link. Yesterday, I had to write out the full HTML, which annoys me.

That got me thinking... I don't have any control over the server side of the app, so I can't add custom tags in there. But I *DO* have control over the client (or at least enough to make a difference). So I got to work with some javascript haxing.

I'm not too good with either javaScript OR regular expressions, but I make due.

var pees = document.getElementsByTagName("p");
var RegExp = /\s(http[s]?:[/]+[\S]+)/g
for(var k = 0; k < pees.length; k++)
{
pees[k].innerHTML = pees[k].innerHTML.replace(RegExp, " $1");
}

The Blogger template gives me crap about malformed xml, so I crammed it into a .js and put it up on my server. It's at http://www.poonheads.com/replace.js . It's not 100%, but it gets the job done. Using the same principle (and a lot of wasted time making up regex's) I could probably hack up all kinds of stuff.

If I plan on doing a lot of code excerpts, I should probably hack up the <code> tag to display angle brackets and spaces. But I'm really lazy so I might not ever get around to it. Probably won't ever get around to it. But you never know.

So, do I get to call myself a javascript hacker yet? This counts, right?

Anyways, if you want more info on regex or javascript check out http://www.regular-expressions.info/ and http://www.w3schools.com/js/default.asp respectively.

Until next time,

~Ben

Of pngs and Feeds

I managed to shoe horn the RSS feed into the front page of Poonheads.com. You can get to it, by the way, by hitting the Home link in the menu there at the top of the page.

Now, this was a challenge for me. At work, I mostly use PHP and javaScript. In all my wisdom, however, I decided to program poonheads.com in C#.net 2.0. I hadn't touched the code in about a year and a half when I initially wrote it ( and it was fresh in my mind from my .Net programming class).

Originally, the main news post on the front page pulled from an XML page on my server. It was just a matter of changing the reference to the Blogger feed. And adjusting to the feed's new schema. Which sucked because my xml file is really simple and the blogger feed was very much not simple. So it took a lot of trial and error. I provide you now with the code. The secret was the InferSchema part.

DataSet newsSet = new DataSet();
newsSet.ReadXml("http://poonheads.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default", XmlReadMode.InferSchema);
DataRow newPost = newsSet.Tables["entry"].Rows[0];
lbl_title.Text = newsSet.Tables["title"].Rows[1][1].ToString();
lbl_poster.Text = newsSet.Tables["author"].Rows[1][0].ToString();
lbl_time.Text = newPost[1].ToString().Substring(0, 10);
String body_text = newsSet.Tables["summary"].Rows[0][1].ToString();
if (body_text.Length > 250)
{
      body_text += "...";
}
a_continue.Text = "CONTINUE READING";
lbl_text.Text = body_text.Replace("\n", "<br />");
a_continue.NavigateUrl = newsSet.Tables["link"].Rows[3]["href"].ToString();
So, I don't know if that helps, but that's what it is. I don't feel like commenting or explaining it. I figure anyone who's looking at this probably knows kind of what's going on and would be able to figure it out.

I'm not really sure of a good way to display code in blogger. I'll probably just put some border around the <code>s with css. That ought to work good enough. Which brings me to my next point.

IE does not properly support .png alpha transparency. I've always known this, but never really bothered until I downloaded the RSS icon, which used alpha transparency. I didn't really want to mess with making another one, so I decided on just looking up an IE hack. I found a couple, but the results were kind of meh.

So I present to you the only foolproof 100% effective way to deal with alpha transparency in IE: Don't use alpha transparency in your pngs. Use indexed pngs or use gifs. Create your design without having to rely on transparency and everyone will be happy. The end.

So that's all I have for today. Except this random youtube video David showed me: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YgnloJgui1U

Until next time.

~~Ben

Wisdom is Back!

Welcome!!

The critically acclaimed, yet much ignored, original Poonheads.com feature has returned. Wisdom is back!

As you may or may not remember, the original Poonheads.com did not have a News section... it had Wisdom. I didn't want to limit the literary section of my site to just news, or just a personal blog, or just a place to discuss the technical aspects of my comicking. I wanted a place where I could combine all of these into one comprehensive collection. I wanted a place where I could write a thousand words of smart, thoughtful, prose that would complement the asinine antics of the characters in my comics. I wanted a place where I could share my wisdom with the world.

I don't mean to sound arrogant, even though that's how it seems sometimes. It just happens that I know a lot about a lot of things. I know a lot about things that many people don't think about. I think about a lot of things that people don't know about. Many of the things I think about are things that most people don't want to think about. I thought that my unique perspective on things would be of some use to everyone out there. Everyone who wants a unique perspective on things, anyway. And I thought my website would make a great vehicle for such perspectives.

As far as I know, not a whole lot of people actually read the wisdom. With the decline in comic production towards the end of Poonheads 2, I let the Wisdoms slip as well. Upon creating the current incarnation of Poonheads Dot Com, Wisdom faded completely into News where I primarily bitched about not having enough time to update and how stressed I was.

Now that Wisdom is back, however, I'll attempt to be just as insightful as I was once upon a time. With any luck, I'll update more often (perhaps daily). I'll try my damnedest to avoid writing about depressing emo crap. And I'll undoubtedly be as verbose as ever.

So, now that you all know what's in store, you're probably wondering why I've succumbed to a prepackaged, third party blogging software. I typically do things myself and tend to enjoy the coding and creating of custom apps. These days, I code all day at work and, in the very near future, I'll be programming a large custom app for the dean of my school. When I get home in the evening, the last thing I want to do is more of the same.

The current system is pretty good, why not just use that? Several reasons. First of all, it's cumbersome. I have to code everything by hand in either HTML or the custom markup I created. Also, the permissions on my server are always getting reset, so before I make a post, I've always got to go in and change the permissions back.

Secondly, I would rather trust the security of my data to someone who deals with it daily. That's what Blogger is. That's what they do and they do it well. Not to mention they're owned by Google. If the blog server goes down, Google will have to deal with it, not me. I dont' have to deal with tech support. It's all abstracted and very magical. And, because it's a different server, if my web server goes down or gets compromised, Wisdom will remain intact and online.

Thirdly, joining a community, such as Blogger, will provide more exposure. More exposure == more readers. With more readers, my wisdom will not go wasted into the night. What's the point of creating something if no one will see it? There's isn't one.

So, now that I've got an easier and faster way of getting my ideas down on paper (and by "down on paper", I mean "online"), I'll hopefully be able to retain the motivation to keep it up this time. Keep checking back to see what happens. Or don't. You're call.

Well, it's getting late and I'm finding it more and more difficult to form cohesive thoughts, so I think I'm going to go to bed.

Until Next time.

~~Ben