Kujira Katsu くじらカツ

Kujira Katsu くじらカツ, or Whale Cutlets, in the cafeteria of a university where I teach. You can see the dark beefiness of the meat compared to the lighter-colored chicken cutlets on the left. The price is right. Add a ¥31 bowl of negi-tofu miso-shiru and a bowl of rice for ¥100 and you're set for under ¥400. I wouldn't order it but I have tasted whale before.

Made On A Mac with Ubuntu (& GIMP)

I don't actually recommend getting a Mac if you want to run Linux, but that's what I have. Not only because I had the legacy PowerPC architecture, which Apple barely supports anymore--although Debian and other Linux distros do, but because I wanted the small, light, cheap, quiet, Intel-powered, MacOSX-(as a fallback)-capable Mac Mini. That turns out to have been a mistake, as I virtually never boot MacOSX and the "SuperDrive" super-failed. It is quiet, however, unlike the PowerPC and its ever-roaring fan that kept us awake on the next floor unless you manually selected Sleep. For those of us who have taken this path, here is my rendition of Made on a Mac in Ubuntu, with GIMP logo optional, 216x216 and smaller. For people who want to run Linux, at the moment I'd recommend ASUS (reliability reports) and Ubuntu (userbase size, package selection, polish, and commitment to language support) as my first choices.



What happened to the Drop Shadow I added to the Ubuntu logo, I don't know... either it disappeared when I saved it as a png instead of a jpg, or I forgot to save that particular change. So be it.

Karoshi?

Karoshi (?) may not be the best name for a school-oriented Linux distribution, imho. Teachers do work hard, but I'm not sure if the creators didn't do their research or were deliberately being ironic. Karoshi is also the name of a game that came out in 2008.

Legalize Arizona

A check of the relevant papers has determined that Arizona entered the United States illegally. The state has been returned to Mexico.

Revisiting Constructed Languages

I took a constructed language walkabout today, reading about the USA in constructed languages:

Mergu'e (Lojban)
http://jbo.wikipedia.org/wiki/mergu
That's almost 100% unintelligible words.


Statos Unite de America (Interlingua)
http://ia.wikipedia.org/wiki/Statos_Unite_de_America
That's almost 100% intelligible to any educated westerner.


Unionita Stati di Amerika, abreviata Usa, (Ido)
http://io.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usa
Ido is an offspring of Esperanto--and an improvement. Notice it's now the "Wikipedio".


Unuiĝintaj Ŝtatoj de Ameriko (=Usono) (Esperanto)
http://eo.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usono
Diacritics suck. Who needs 'em? (It's the "Vikipedio")
And too much inflection. I want an isolating language.
Sorry, Esperanto. It's a shame.


Unionati States de Amerika (Novial)
http://nov.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unionati_States_de_Amerika
(It's the WikipediE)


Lamerikän (Volapük)
http://vo.wikipedia.org/wiki/USA
(In the Vükiped)


Lojban is really going to have an uphill struggle.
Lojban picture dictionary: (pixra liste loi gismu)
http://jbo.wikipedia.org/wiki/pixra_liste_loi_gismu

I like the ideas of Lojban in principle (when reading about it), but in practice (when reading in it), I'm more inclined to favor Interlingua after a brief tour of the constructed languages wikipedia pages for Mergu'e, also known as Statos Unite de America, Unionita Stati di Amerika, Unuiĝintaj Ŝtatoj de Ameriko, Unionati States de Amerika, and Lamerikän.

A lot of linguistic cruft is disposed of with the principle that if one language doesn't have it (a linguistic feature) then Interlingua doesn't need it. It must be 5 times easier than learning Spanish. I wish they could teach that to kids in elementary school as a prelude to going on to Spanish or French or something else.

Interlingua could be a good language for the EU. They can't always provide a translation for every document in every language but an Interlingua version could be a neutral compromise.

Lojban has been criticized as Procrustean, re-inventing the wheel of the language corpus from the most commonly co-occurring phonemes of Chinese, English, Arabic, Russian, Spanish, and Hindi/Urdu, and as a result producing words unintelligible to any speaker.

The reason I was thinking about this was because of a new constructed language which I read about: ROILA, the RObot Interaction LAnguage.

The flow just won't stop:-(

As thousands of sea birds, endangered turtles, fish, and wildlife of all kinds lay dying in a sea of oil, millions of Americans were disappointed today to see the live video feed showing that the valve work has failed to stop the flow of blood to Dick Cheney's brain.

"Paul the Octopus" vs "Sarah Palin"

Paul the Octopus is currently leading Sarah Palin in the polls for the preferred Republican Presidential candidate in 2012. Voters are weighing doubts about the candidate's eligibility for the office and a suspected foreign place of birth with the possibility that the other candidate's brain is a sac of water. The creature's "brain", or water-filled sac, is believed to help propel the creature through the surrounding media.

Octoracle

The lyrics as well as I can make out:

Paul the Octopus
by Aiden Ajar

I'm just a cephalopod
I'm only 2 years old
oh--but I'm the 8 legged oracle
or so I'm told

oh wonderful octopus
you're the great prophet of our time
we need a leader to reveal us truth
if I feed you mussels will you please be mine?

all attention will be on your tank
we'll base our lives on the way you behave
be our master, be our saviour
most of all be our slave

I'm just a cephalopod
I've never even seen a tv
oh you think that I control your destiny
oh I don't even know I live in Germany

oh terrible octopus
you're the worst mollusk of our time
we needed you to reveal us truth
--well, I suppose you did but we do not like the truth--
we hold you responsible
off with your tentacles
I will eat you
I will eat you
I will eat you

I'm just a cephalopod
I don't even know what FIFA is!
don't barbecue me
don't cut me into pieces
don't crucify me
I never asked to be your jesus...

(edited 2010¤07·16°)

Carry On My Hayward Son

Hayward (as in Tony) sounds a little like "wayward". It makes a guy think...


Carry On My Hayward Son
(adopted from KANSAS)

Carry on my Hayward son(-of-a-bitch)
There'll "BP" when you are done
Stop the gushing leaking oil
Don't you spill no more

Once I sank below the noise and confusion
"Beyond Petroleum" was just an illusion
I was drilling ever deeper
But I drilled too deep

Killed eleven on the rig in the fire
Burned alive to help our stock price go higher
I hear the voices when I'm drilling
I can hear them say

Refrain
Carry on my Hayward son(-of-a-bitch)
There'll "BP" when you are done
Stop the gushing leaking oil
Don't you spill no more


Tried the Top Hat and the Junk Shot and Top Kill
Lied to everyone about how much we spill
"Boot on your neck!" said Salazar
but his balls are in our jar.

On a stormy sea of moving emulsion
Nauseated by oceanic revulsion
I try to hide it with dispersent
But I hear the voices say

Refrain
Carry on my Hayward son(-of-a-bitch)
There'll "BP" when you are done
Stop the gushing leaking oil
Don't you spill no more

No!

Carry on, you will always remember
Carry on, it's the fault of the vendor
Blowout preventer from Transocean
Halliburton's concrete plug

Carry on my Hayward son(-of-a-bitch)
There'll "BP" when you are done
Stop the gushing leaking oil
Don't you spill (don't you spill no more)



The original lyrics are not irrelevant to the situation, either.

(by KANSAS)
Carry on my wayward son
There'll be peace when you are done
Lay your weary head to rest
Don't you cry no more

Once I rose above the noise and confusion
Just to get a glimpse beyond this illusion
I was soaring ever higher
But I flew too high

Though my eyes could see I still was a blind man
Though my mind could think I still was a mad man
I hear the voices when I'm dreaming
I can hear them say

{Refrain

Masquerading as a man with a reason
My charade is the event of the season
And if I claim to be a wise man, well
It surely means that I don't know

On a stormy sea of moving emotion
Tossed about I'm like a ship on the ocean
I set a course for winds of fortune
But I hear the voices say

{Refrain
No!

Carry on, you will always remember
Carry on, nothing equals the splendor
The center lights around your vanity
But surely heaven waits for you

Carry on my wayward son
There'll be peace when you are done
Lay your weary head to rest
Don't you cry (don't you cry no more)

Congratulations!

http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2010/05/robot-graduation-party/

"Willow Garage was founded in 2006 with the idea of creating an open-source robotics software platform. The hardware isn’t open but the company has created open source programming to drive the machine. Willow Garage’s Robot Operating System (ROS) originated at Stanford’s Artificial Intelligence Laboratory. ROS is based on Linux and can work with both Windows and Mac PCs."

BP-irates of the Caribbean

BP-irates of the Caribbean: "Dead Man's Deepwater Horizon" -- coming soon to a coastline near you!

Update: Perfectionism kicked in; I wasn't happy with kwik'n'dirty version and edited it.

Ubuntini

New Kevin, the Koncerned Kommuter

Another annoying entry in the
series, not only because the kid could be listening to his lectures, but the drunk salariman or group of three housewives are usually the ones shouting to talk louder than the volume of a noisy train, which makes it doubly difficult to hear anything on earbuds. Nobody says a word to them -- it's a noisy train, after all-- but harrassing people for the whisper of noise that might escape from their earbuds in the seconds stopping at the station is encouraged. It's bizarre, but at least someone broke Kevin's leg again last month.
I think the music-lover may be misinterpreting Kevin as an oversensitive victim, when he's just digging out some ear wax in his spare time.
The campaign seems to be running out of ideas, recycling the same nonsense, although they've gone to positive (?) behaviors now. Try people who sneeze all over others without covering their mouths, and the ones who pick their noses and flick it onto other passengers? Maybe it's not good manners to attack the retarded, though.

Malware Warning from Big Brother Google

I visited my own site and found it was blocked as containing a link to malware on theforeigner.



I didn't want to be bullied by Google into blocking sites that may not be evil. However, the diagnostic site at Google does have evidence of evil at theforeigner. That doesn't necessarily mean that theforeigner were the perps or had any knowledge of it, but I removed the links from my sidebar. I rarely visit the sites that are in my sidebar anyway.



Happy surfing!

De-Macify your Ubuntu!

The new Ubuntu 10.04 "Lucid Lynx" Linux distribution went with the undemocratic decision to move the Menu, Close, Minimize, and Maximize buttons from the right to the left! This may be good for Mac users, but having already broken my 15-year-old Mac habit, I prefer to keep the buttons on the right. I won't be upgrading my OS right away anyway, as everything is working well now, but eventually I will switch to 10.04. When I do so, I will immediately move the buttons back to the right using gconf-editor as explained at UbuStu and How-to Geek, among other places. I do think Ubuntu has damaged their standing with this move. It's put me off a little bit. I think many users will migrate downstream to Mint or upstream to Debian. I have been considering Debian, in particular Skolelinux to replace Edubuntu. I've also been considering a more multimedia-oriented distro such as Ubuntu Studio since it seems that in audio and video is where Linux fails or falls short of the ease of use of Mac, so I would like that functionality to be the best it can be and see if it can compete.

I've not upgraded the distribution, but have changed to Shiki-Dust as the window border and Breathe as the icon theme instead of Gartoon. I changed to a grassy desktop wallpaper, too.

Incidentally, the Mac Mini I am using as my main computer is a POS. The "Superdrive" doesn't work at all, with any OS, so I have attached the Buffalo branded portable CD drive that I bought to use with my ASUS 1000HE. Also, the hard drive is the only one among various drives, up to 10 years old, that shows bad blocks and may be failing. This, although I bought it last June! I was considering returning it under warranty, but I don't know how long that would take, and at least the Core 2 Duo CPU and 4GB memory works OK; that's all I need. I regret that I won't be able to contribute to showing Apple's truly bad performance, but since I resolve to not buy an AAPL again, maybe that will be enough. It has been a big mistake. It takes Linux 5 minutes to boot on this machine, and it's not dependable. I don't really need the Mac OS to fall back on as an OS, and if I did, I could have used the older 2003 and earlier PowerPCs upstairs in the PC Lounge and Museum, formerly known as the PowerPC Lounge and Museum.

I was recently offered a Fujitsu "FMV Deskpower CE7/857"with Windows Millenium Edition still installed. I accepted it and found it readily let me install Fedora (which I rejected because it seemed like a pain to install the mp3 and dvd codecs), then MEPIS (which was better but still lacked some codecs and was ugly in a bad-kde way), and finally Xubuntu (9.10), which was attractive and worked well once I connected it, downloaded the codecs and input methods, VLC, etc, and made it into a multi-regional DVD player. The machine does have the unusual habit of randomly opening the DVD/CD tray every few hours, but this doesn't seem to disrupt playing a movie or even installing software; I simply push the button and it goes back in and resumes the movie or install. As free junk, it has better value than the Mac Mini, as it can play DVDs and happily runs any Linux you care to put on it.

¿(¡Viva la immigración!)?

Could wearing a sombrero and bandana (and growing a bushy mustache) be a viable way for Arizonans to protest state law SB1070?

Hide and Seek

Stephen Hawking (not to be confused with Stephen King) says it may be best to Hide from Extra Terrestrial Intelligence.(You can still search for it, but be vewy vewy quiet.)

Blow away the smoke

I still hear people (but more commonly oil company commercials) saying that wind can only provide 15 or 20% of the energy society consumes. But, of course, if you scale your electrical grid up to, say, the size of the North American continent, the wind never stops blowing simultaneously over the entire continent, and there's no reason you can't get 100%, 200%, 500% of your energy needs from the wind, depending on how big you scale it up. This article supports that point, but I'm not sure how much good it will do compared to the many hours of commercial messages from the oil companies that TV viewers have seen.

"...while it comes and goes locally, at this larger scale, the wind never really stops blowing.

The researchers studied five years of wind observations during different seasons from 11 monitoring stations along the coast and developed a hypothetical "Atlantic Transmission Grid" that would string together a thin line of off-shore windmills along the Eastern Seaboard from Maine to Miami.

Their results show daily weather data along this experimental Atlantic Transmission Grid "yields uninterrupted power output." Such a grid would connect five-megawatt off-shore turbines such as these (pictured) off the coast of Belgium."

http://news.discovery.com/earth/power-of-the-wind-thinking-bigger.html

http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2010/03/29/0909075107.abstract

see also
http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2009/06/19/0904101106.abstract

Both of those publications are free to download in their entirety as PDFs.

Macbot News

Macbots, a Mac Tonnies tribute site, is developing nicely. There was an interview on Technoccult with facilitators blazingbetta and capnmarrrrk. Mac's last book, The Cryptoterrestrials: A Meditation on Indigenous Humanoids and the Aliens Among Us, published posthumously, is available from Anomolist books, amazon.co.jp and amazon.com. I haven't got it yet.

BRL and beyond

I never used to watch Break Room Live because I listened to it. They had some good video clips that I never noticed until now.

Our poor fallen masters. Give generously.


Sam


Marc's House!


Cats.