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Zune 30 Pandemic

Olaf — Wed, 31 Dec 2008 16:03:19 +0000

Oh, good grief! I awoke this morning to find my Zune in a less than pleasing way. I was concerned that the number of times I’ve dropped the device had finally caught up with me and I was paying the ultimate price. However, I decided to check out what was being said online about this problem – perhaps it’s something Microsoft can service. What do I find? A pandemic of global proportions effecting only Zune 30 users. It sounds like it’s related to a date bug in the device, but it has yet to be answered by Microsoft. Some have hope that normal operation will resume tomorrow, when the date resolves firmly to day 1 of 365. I’m not holding my breath. The timing couldn’t be worse as we’re heading off for a short vacation tomorrow. If neither mine nor my wife’s Zune won’t work, I’ll be sorely disappointed.

I had thought this might be a good excuse to buy an upgrade to the newer generation Zune 80 or 120, but I’d have to find my place all over again in the current audiobook I’m listening to (“The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo”). Arrrrgh!

Search around on the net and you’ll find no shortage of complaints and Microsoft bashing surrounding this recent development. It’s a sad day, and ironic one too. I had just poked fun at a friend recently who bought an iPod without thinking of the alternative. To be fair, however, had she bought a current model Zune, she’d be unaffected by the problem.

*UPDATE* Microsoft has released a statement regarding the Zune 30 bug that hit all of us this morning. They’re essentially telling everyone to wait until tomorrow morning to turn on the Zune. As of 7:00am for Eastern timezone folks, your Zune will magically begin working again; almost ass mysteriously as it stopped.

Though it’s not in their official release, the problem is most likely due to a bug in its ability to handle a leap year, which 2008 qualified. The idea being that a leap year has around 366 days instead of the usualy 365. As of January 1st, Greenwich Meantime, the device will be back on 1 of 365 – and working. It’s a logical solution, but a very unfortunate goof for the Zune hardware team. Maybe we’ll get a coupon toward the purchase of a new generation Zune in the mail for our trouble (ahem…are you listening, Zune team)!

Sorscha the Serious

Olaf — Fri, 14 Nov 2008 20:09:58 +0000

We’re starting to see a more wakeful baby now. She’s staying awake during longer periods of the day – only to nurse relentlessly upon her mother. She has gained a good amount of weight and shows all signs of being a very healthy girl. Of some uniqueness, she’s quite grunty. We get the impression that she’s largely displeased with being awake. However, she’s still not very fussy. As we’re seeing more of her eyes now, I think they’re going to be green/hazel like ours.

Lennart Green Magic Amazes TEDrs

Olaf — Tue, 09 Sep 2008 18:55:10 +0000

Lennart Green, the foremost close-up card magician of the world, dazzled the audience of TED 2005. I caught the video today on my Zune and was thrilled. His show is very entertaining, quick witted, and his foreignness is close to my heart (Green is from Gothenburg, Sweden). The TED video is around 30 minutes of goodness. Green had me laughing often, and his hand work is second to none. If you ever wanted to be a magician, watch this video and give up on your dreams. You’ll never amount to anything!

Road Rash is Like Diaper Rash, but Not as Cute

Olaf — Wed, 27 Aug 2008 15:21:56 +0000

Carlos brought to my attention his recent exploration of road rash. Oh, Carlos, where can I learn more? Personal experience is often a better teacher than anything else.

Today I took my first big spill on my bicycle. I was very close to work, as it often happens, so I finished up the ride with blood running down my leg. When I got to work and hit the shower, I learned the extent of the damage. In describing this for my right leg, it’s probably easier to talk about the parts that remained undamaged. They’re without noticeable tan, hairy, but otherwise beautiful. Maybe a few lumps and scars from previous accidents. Oh, and rare hamburger meat comes to mind when looking elsewhere.

It’s entirely my fault. I was shooting across a green light with traffic to avoid stopping and losing my pace. The roads are wet from all the rain, so when traffic stopped just after the light, I was unable to follow suit. I touched the front brake to slow me down, but the front tire instantly locked up. Too much pressure, apparently. With that, it was a matter of 1 second before all hope of regaining composure was lost. I flattened out on the road with my bike and slid for an eternity before finally stopping myself with my face…on the curb. The curb is okay and only suffered minor indignities. I actually had time to think about how bad the road rash was going to be while I slid. I was toying with the idea that it may not be so bad because of the wet roads – a true fact, actually. Funny thing about these things is that you don’t really feel the pain until after you stop. I felt heat on my leg from the friction, but that was it. And like a 10-year-old, I jumped up out of the street and yanked my bike up onto the sidewalk as if to pretend nothing happened. I was asked if I was okay and needed a ride, but the adrenaline and shock had me thinking I’d be fine, if only a little scuffed up. I am okay, truly. The rash on my leg hurts pretty bad, but it’s tolerable.

I was able to get it cleaned up pretty well in the shower at work, though I will need to do some scouring at home. The worst part at the moment is that I’m wearing jeans that are slowly getting damp with, presumably, lymph fluid. My buddy, Brandon, is picking up the medical supplies to keep me from sticking to the jeans. I have some additional precautions to take while riding in the rain, but I didn’t really learn how to avoid the lock-up problem. Brandon says disc brakes are better for “modulating” to avoid the lock-up. Calipers tend to give you all or nothing, which is certainly what it felt like today. On a positive note, I’ve now ridden nearly 350 miles commuting.

Twitter Updates for 2008-07-31

Olaf — Fri, 01 Aug 2008 04:59:59 +0000

I watched “The Fun with Dick and Jane” yesterday. Enjoyable movie – reminds me of “Trading Places.” #
Adobe Illustrator gives me a headache. #
@DinoRubble Photoshop and Premiere I’m good with. The rest largely elludes me, though I think I’ve been irritated with PageMaker too. #
We’re instituting new “Green” janitorial services at work. Associates requested to carry trash to common dumping area. #
@DinoRubble I like ‘peduncle’ and hope to use to describe some part of the human anatomy. Applying botanical terms to the body is dirty! #
Livin’ like a felon…I’m using Panera for their wireless access AND I DIDN’T ORDER ANYTHING TO EAT/DRINK! #
I’d make a bad felon – I bought a cheese danish. Arrrrgh! #

No Polluter Commuter!

Olaf — Fri, 20 Jun 2008 17:33:56 +0000

I’m not much of an activist, but I have taken action in support of our environment. As of this past Monday, I began what I hope to be a consistent plan to reduce my gas consumption, reduce mileage on my car, and increase my fitness level. I am currently riding a bicycle for the most idle-intensive leg of my 40-mile commute to work. Depending on the season, the idle-intensive phase consists of approximately 30-45 minutes of time over about 10 miles. I’m working my way up to this distance, possibly further, with each day that I commute on the bike. I started Monday with a 3-mile ride; Wednesday was 4 miles, and now Friday is at 6 miles. Friday is unique in that I went off my normal route to meet-up with a friend for the ride in. That may have added an extra mile. I’m trying to keep my average speed at or above 10 miles/hour so as to one day ride the whole distance in an hour or less. So far, this has not been a real problem. I have been able to keep my average up over 15mph during this innagural week. It has been 10 years or more since I last rode any, so I can only assume I’ll get better. The hardest part has been finding a place to park my car so it won’t get towed while I’m at work! That, and getting over saddle-soreness. I was told before that that was the part of my body that needed to get broken in slowly. A person of moderate fitness can probably hop on a bike and ride 12 miles, but the saddle pains will make them regret it. So it’s best to work your way up, if for nothing else, to break-in the tush.

At any rate, the ride has been exhilerating and not nearly as difficult as I thought, even in the summer heat. I haven’t ridden in the rain yet, but expect to. I’m still trying to outfit myself appropriately; bike gear and accessories can be very expensive. Right now, I’m trying to get some good panniers to carry my stuff. I’m using a great backpack to carry my laptop and a change of clothes, but this is less than ideal for several reasons.

As a side benefit of breaking out the old bike (13-14 years old, actually), Balthazar took an immediate interest in riding with me. He has done really well in picking up on the mechanics of riding. He’s still in training wheels for his first week, but I don’t think it will take him long to graduate.

It’s so funny because I’ve had this bike forever and never put any thought towards trying to make time for it. When I was younger and didn’t have a car, the bike was my only mode of transportation. I don’t know why it never occured to me that I could again replace my transportation with a bicycle, even if only for a small portion of my total commute.

So here I am, doing my part for the environment and being green. Fitting. I am sporting a tattoo of the Green Man on my shoulder blade.

The Lumberjacks were Here

Olaf — Tue, 20 Nov 2007 14:41:30 +0000

This morning a guy with a fluorescent-green shirt came to the door a little after 8:00am. “It’s a little too early to be sporting that color,” I thought. Apparently, after 7 or 8 years now, it was time for the local officials to take notice of a small stand of Mimosa trees I had reared from seeds. Two of them them were growing underneath the power lines, and seen as a serious enough risk that they would be cut down immediately. It’s very unfortunate because the trees are beautiful and provide some cover from the neighborhood traffic during the summer. I’m thankful, I guess, that they didn’t have to cut the biggest down. But I’m still sad to see them go. My wife was able to salvage a portion of the second tree; they merely cut the offending limbs off.

Bah! Wireless power will be all the rage in the future…

Superhero Quiz (Revisited)

Olaf — Tue, 28 Aug 2007 19:18:54 +0000

I was reminded of the Superhero quiz today and thought I should try it again to see how the results compare or contrast.
Today, I am Green Lantern

Green Lantern		70%
Superman		65%
Robin		62%
Spider-Man		60%
Catwoman		60%
The Flash		60%
Iron Man		55%
Supergirl		50%
Batman		50%
Wonder Woman		40%
Hulk		40%

~~Hot-headed.~~ You have strong
will power and a good imagination.

Times have changed, but I wasn’t far off from Green Lantern last time. It’s interesting to note that there’s a 60% chance I’m Catwoman. Meeeeoow!

Find out who you are here, and trackback here so I’ll know.

Polar Cities

Olaf — Mon, 23 Jul 2007 20:00:07 +0000

I must prefix this post with a bit of back story…

A reader in Taiwan, Danny Bee, left a comment on an article I wrote (“Emily Yoffe Learns The Secret“). I had first assumed that the comment was spam, though the suspect spam did not follow my preconceived notions of spam. It had no sales pitch, no links, and no inappropriate words. However, it didn’t exactly fit the article on which it was submitted:

Yoffe captures my concerns about the modern inception of philosophical teachings. Not by coming out and saying it, but by a simple inference from her experiences. I’ll remind my readers that I’m not bashing these teachings, only the glossy cover and Cliff’s Notes by which so many establish their adoption.

…and Mr. Bee’s response:

Polar cities in the far distant future to house remnants of humankind
who survive the apocalypse of devastating global warming? The casual
reader might think I am an alarmist or a mere scare-monger, but I am
neither. I am a visionary.

So like a good blogger, I engaged Danny in some email communications (to verify he was a real person) and tossed out the idea that I write something up on my opinion of his comment. I did check into Polar Cities a bit. Wikipedia has a very brief explanation of them.

Polar cities are proposed sustainable polar retreats designed to house human beings in the future, in the event that global warming causes the central and middle regions of the Earth to become uninhabitable for a long period of time. Although they have not been built yet, some futurists have been giving considerable thought to the concepts involved.

High-population-density cities, to be built near the Arctic Rim with sustainable energy and transportation infrastructure, will require substantial nearby agriculture. Boreal soils are largely poor in key nutrients like nitrogen and phosphorus, but nitrogen-fixing plants (such as thevarious alders) with the proper symbiotic microbes and mycorrhizal fungi can likely remedy such poverty without the need for petroleum-derived fertilizers. Regional probiotic soil improvement should perhaps rank high on any polar cities priority list. James Lovelock’s notion of a widely distributed almanac of science knowledge and post-industrial survival skills also appears to have value.

As Danny says it, he’s not an alarmist nor a scare-monger, just a visionary. He didn’t rule out cuckoo, though to be fair, zealous may be more apt.

The idea of Polar Cities is in response to doomsday concepts from global warming. Should the ecosystem collapse as a result of a massive build-up of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, then this idea has only rhetorical value. As for the development and planning of Polar Cities for this foreseen eventuality, I think it either a bad plan or at least very pessimistic.

The estimated surface area of our polar land masses seems pretty high – almost 30 million km². Our population is over 6.7 billion at the moment. If you do the math on just those numbers, you get population density of around 224 persons/km². But I think that argument is far too simple. If we assume that 3/4 of the earth’s population dies due to the volatility of the environment, you’re left with 1.675 billion people looking for ocean-front property. I was also being nice by saying that we had nearly 30 million square kilometers of land mass between our two polar regions. If you look at what happens after the ice sheets melt, land rises from a release in pressure, and volcanoes blow, you’re looking at a lot less inhabitable land after all. I’ll cut it in half to 15 million km² because I’m skeptical about our building too close to volcanoes, fault lines, and other natural disasters. I also have to account for the plethora of lake and rivers that would undoubtedly remain on Antarctica – not to mention its steep mountain sides and craggy peaks. Now you’re looking at a population density of around 112 persons per square kilometer. That’s actually not that bad. There are far worse places in the world as far as population density goes.

Now that we have a workable number of people, we can start analyzing what this new homestead would be like.

I imagine a world metropolis at each pole (technically, the Arctic surrounds the pole). All nations and all diversity of people have centralized in two locations of the planet. The central lands of Earth have become desolate and hostile. You can venture out onto them, but survivability is contingent upon resources and exposure. The populations live in high-rise hotels methodically placed in a grid over the available land masses. The fringe area of decent land would be more barren of people than the central, cooler parts. Unfortunately, most people would need to be in Antarctica because of its concentration of land at the pole. Each hotel would be surrounded by land necessary to grow food and raise livestock. Everyone in the square kilometer living unit would be required to do their share of work to earn their food and living quarters. I’m not entirely sure how waste would be dealt with – perhaps pumping it into magma faults would suffice, but it may also be problematic in maintaining such a system. A refinery would probably take up too much valuable land area.

There would certainly be a militant government in place at both polar regions. I doubt anything more than a form of Feudalism would be adopted. With so many different people from different backgrounds, humans would probably resort to brute strength. With anarchy-like crime abound and tough living conditions, citizens would surely profess an allegiance to a “king” for support.

A glimpse into what living in Polar Cities might be like seems more like a good idea for a Science Fiction novel than any reality we should plan for. I can almost see an adaptation of “Firefly” applying to Earth’s new living conditions. While interesting to contemplate, I think time is better spent learning what exactly is happening to the environment, and reducing our adverse impact to it. Then again, if the environmental changes are a natural evolution in planetary cycle, then we humans are going to go through some hard times. I don’t think Darwin’s theory of natural selection comes without its pain. A species must suffer untold losses to survive with its fittest.

Christmas is a Time for Family, the Black Mafia Family

Olaf — Thu, 14 Dec 2006 20:43:45 +0000

My Jewish friend at work, Mr. Smith, brought to my attention a Creative Loafing series about the Black Mafia Family (BMF). Just in time for the holidays I learned about a brotherhood so rich in…well…ice, scrilla, green, snow, and other hip-hop terms I’m learning. The whole nasty crew started up as small-time drug dealers and evolved into demi gods in hip-hop and an international partnership to move cocaine. What’s particularly stupid is that they maintained the same immature sense of being thugs and tough-guys while completely ignoring a little thing called the “man.” They named their record label BMF, which is never really a good move when you’re trying to keep a low profile. They also frequented local clubs to spend tens of thousands a night. Often times, these little gatherings ended in somebody getting the crap beaten out of them or shot dead. I’m not exactly sure why it took so long to close the deal on this gang, but they’re done now. Or at least the heavy-hitters are in jail or dead. It kind of looked like the “families” would eventually kill eachother off anyway, so it was only a matter of time before they were eliminated one way or the other. There’s a lesson in this for the kids out there interested in gansta’ life portrayed through modern hip-hop. I’d tell you, but that wouldn’t be very creative. Besides, you owe it to yourself to read the lengthy bit on Creative Loafing regarding this subject.