tadhg.com
tadhg.com
 

Posts concerning e-prime

Marketese

23:46 30 Nov 2006. Updated: 00:50 01 Dec 2006

I find marketing speak very difficult to listen to. I would guess that most people feel similarly, but if so, why does it persist? Even without dealing with the more egregious examples—such as press releases and “on-message” politicians—it simply gets to me.
[more...]

Permalink     Comment     [, , ]    

‘Flow Episode’

23:45 29 Nov 2006

I survey the board calmly, without needing to. I know what resides there. I know the available possibilities. I draw a card, and add its potential to what I hold already.
[more...]

Permalink     Comment     [, , , , , , , ]    

A Bad MTG Year

21:06 28 Nov 2006. Updated: 08:42 04 Dec 2006

In the 2005 sfmagic Player of the Year race, I stayed in contention until the second-last week, and then only dropped out of contention because I had to miss the final draft. In this year’s race, I have very little hope of even making it into the top five.
[more...]

Permalink     Comment     [, , , , , ]    

Work Versus Play

23:59 27 Nov 2006

What separates the two? The question has some hidden depths—especially after reading Play Money last weekend, which details the world of trading virtual assets in MMORPGs. Also, I spent my weekend happily fascinated by JavaScript challenges that a lot of people would have difficulty distinguishing from the “normal work” of a web developer.
[more...]

Permalink     2 Comments     [, , , , , ]    

Enhanced Pricelist Bookmarklet

13:15 26 Nov 2006. Updated: 14:22 26 Nov 2006

As discussed in yesterday’s post about multiple AJAX requests, I wrote an enhanced version of my bookmarklet for improving the magictraders.com price lists.
[more...]

Permalink     Comment     [, , , , ]    

Handling Multiple AJAX Requests

23:28 25 Nov 2006. Updated: 21:42 28 Nov 2006

In working on an enhancement to my card price list sorting bookmarklet, I ran into a problem: if you want to collate data from a number of sources asynchronously, combine the data, then do something with all of it, how do you do that in JavaScript?
[more...]

Permalink     3 Comments     [, , , ]    

Regret

16:25 25 Nov 2006

What good does it do? I ask myself this question over and over, because I have a terrible regret habit, constantly mulling over past mistakes in my mind and wishing I could undo them.
[more...]

Permalink     Comment     [, ]    

Favorite Books of 1999

21:10 24 Nov 2006. Updated: 06:17 23 Aug 2009

Closer, closer to this millennium…
[more...]

Permalink     Comment     [, , , ]    

Power to the Users

23:50 23 Nov 2006. Updated: 22:03 25 Nov 2006

I spent some time today creating a bookmarklet (copy the contents of this page into Firefox or another Gecko-based browser) and greasemonkey script for enhancing the magictraders.com pricelists. This kind of thing exemplifies what I love about HTML, and why I distrust less open technologies.
[more...]

Permalink     Comment     [, , , , , , , ]    

Why Don’t I Play MTGO?

23:38 21 Nov 2006

I’ve had trouble figuring this out. I love playing MTG. And when I first encountered MTGO I worried that I might spend too much money and time on it. Yet I haven’t logged on in more than a year.
[more...]

Permalink     Comment     [, , , ]    

‘The Gift’

23:30 20 Nov 2006. Updated: 00:17 30 Nov 2006

Before they got me, I programmed. Software development. I did fine. But I got bored, ennui creeping into my life, my work, my own projects, everything. Everything suffered under a fog of lethargy and angst. I thought I knew what I wanted to do, but I couldn’t seem to do it. So I went looking for more exciting positions.
[more...]

Permalink     Comment     [, , , , ]    

Why I Like RewriteRule

16:45 19 Nov 2006

I’ve known about Apache Rewrite functionality for quite a while, but have only recently started to think about how much better it can make web applications.
[more...]

Permalink     2 Comments     [, , , ]    

Hawk Hill Cycle

23:53 18 Nov 2006. Updated: 03:07 19 Nov 2006

For the past few Saturdays, I’ve joined Seth on his cycle to Hawk Hill, located in the Marin Headlands.
[more...]

Permalink     Comment     [, ]    

UCLA Campus Police Brutality

11:53 17 Nov 2006. Updated: 17:40 19 Nov 2006

Here’s a cellphone video of a UCLA student getting electrically shocked by police after refusing to show ID in a library—shocked apparently to coerce him to leave after they had already subdued him.
[more...]

Permalink     Comment     [, ]    

Tiptronic transmissions

23:27 16 Nov 2006. Updated: 16:37 21 Nov 2006

I’ve had a chance to drive a few of these recently, and I consider it a good thing that they exist.
[more...]

Permalink     2 Comments     [, ]    

Gaming and Temper

23:56 15 Nov 2006

I seem to find it difficult to remain calm when losing at games. Not always, more casual games rarely disturb me. But games I feel competitive about, well, there I have trouble. I become emotionally involved, and when things go against me, I turn surly.
[more...]

Permalink     2 Comments     [, , , , ]    

Bookmarking Project

17:14 14 Nov 2006. Updated: 19:57 14 Nov 2006

For a while I’ve toyed with the idea of building an application to track my browsing. Something along the lines of del.icio.us, but with files saved to my server.
[more...]

Permalink     1 Comment     [, , , , ]    

Socio-political Limitations

22:25 12 Nov 2006. Updated: 07:18 08 Jan 2007

A scenario I’ve held in my mind for most of my life involves questions of principle, practicality, and transgression. Or, to put it another way, questions about the extent to which your society (which, for these purposes, includes the state) punishes you for stepping outside its bounds.
[more...]

Permalink     Comment     [, , , ]    

Usability and Swiss Pairings

15:17 11 Nov 2006

Usability perfection, or even excellence, does not come easily. For example, a few years ago I created a sheet to guide Swiss pairings for 8 people over 3 rounds for the sfmagic group. I’ve tinkered with it a lot over time, and still find ways to improve it.
[more...]

Permalink     Comment     [, , , ]    

Prohibition and the ‘War on Drugs’

19:01 10 Nov 2006. Updated: 00:18 30 Nov 2006

I just started reading Gus Russo’s The Outfit, a history of the powerful Chicago crime syndicate from the 1920s to the 1960s. Its prologue deals with Prohibition, which effectively presented a massive cash infusion to criminal elements.
[more...]

Permalink     Comment     [, ]    

Favorite Books of 1998

23:12 09 Nov 2006. Updated: 06:01 23 Aug 2009

Slightly late, but getting closer… soon I might reach books I read this millennium.
[more...]

Permalink     1 Comment     [, , , ]    

‘Announcement’

23:35 08 Nov 2006. Updated: 00:18 30 Nov 2006

“… experiencing a delay. We appreciate your patience.”

“Attention station agents and passengers. The delay affects the Castro, Church, or Duboce & Church stations. We appreciate your patience.”

“Attention station agents and passengers. The delay fled from Duboce & Church, apparently towards Van Ness. Inbound trains remain stuck for the time being. We appreciate your patience.”

“Attention station agents. We have a wandering delay loose in the train system. Last seen at Van Ness. Consider the delay armed and dangerous, and do not confront it.”

“Attention station agents. We have cut off access to the tunnels between Van Ness and Civic Center to trap the delay. Do not attempt to apprehend anything coming out of those tunnels.”

“Attention station agents and passengers. We have an all clear for outbound trains. Outbound trains should resume normal service soon.”

“Attention station agents. A SWAT team cornered and killed the wandering delay inbound between Van Ness and Civic Center. Cleanup crews have contained the resulting delay and hope to remove it very shortly.”

“Attention station agents and passengers. We have a cleanup delay at Van Ness. We hope to clear this within an hour. We appreciate your patience. Thank you for riding Muni.”

(200 words)

Permalink     1 Comment     [, , , , , ]    

Ballot Measure Thoughts

16:53 07 Nov 2006

Proposition 90, which would allow property owners to sue the state for damages by claiming that state regulations adversely impact the value of their property, strikes me as horrific. I think it’s the most important measure on the ballot. I would give up my votes on the other propositions in return for the ability to vote against it multiple times.
[more...]

Permalink     Comment     [, ]