Category: Weblog

OK, a quick post while the bisquits are in the oven.
A while ago, I posted a few entries about wanting to know a good method to wash my old Dodgers baseball cap. Many loyal Cruft readers sent in suggestions.
As an unexpected side effect I get hit several times a day by people looking for how to wash baseball caps via search engines. Rather than disappoint them, I thought it would be good to write up this page and answer their question clearly.
Please enjoy How to wash a baseball cap.
In other news, Michele updated her weblog. She’s on a shocking one post per month pace.

Yesterday, my package from Avon arrived.

The device was supposed to have 10 playable Atari games inside the joystick.
Believe it or not, it did.
I wrote up a short review on the Atari 10 in 1 Joystick.
In other news, I finished my book Declare last night. I really enjoyed the last half of the book. Tim Powers is quite an interesting author. The first part of the book reads like a John LeCarre spy novel, full of tradecraft and politics. The second half delves into the fantasy world of djinn and globe spanning conspiracy. Good stuff if you ask me!
Today at the office, I got my hands on a Tablet PC. Oh my. These things are going to be in high demand once the public gets a look of them. Business PDAs are doomed. These Tablets are what people are going to want with them when they are in a meeting.

So I had these great plans for my update tonight and whatnot.
Then I fell asleep on the couch after the kids went to bed and woke up around 11:30.
No quality post tonight, I’m afraid.
Until, get your dose of Zombo.com.

I was at the supermarket today and while looking for Diet Vanilla Coke, I saw this:

Of course I had to buy it. After chilling for a few hours and once the kids had gone to bed, I cracked it open.
Sure enough, it tastes exactly like Red Vines licorice. Exactly.
Admit it, you wish you had some.
On the wireless front, I need to make a correction. ‘tmobile’ is not Boingo. Here are the differences:
Boingo is a company offering wireless access in hotels, airports, and cafes. Boingo is led by Sky Dayton, founder of Earthlink. Access costs $8 for a day, $25 for 10 days of the month, and $75 for unlimited access per month.
T-Mobile Hotspot is a company offering wireless access in Starbucks and airports. T-Mobile is the combination of Voicestream and Deutche Telecom. Access costs $3 plus 25¢/minute, $30/month unlimited local access, $50/month unlimited national access.
Make sense?
BTW, here’s a picture of my antenna in the car window as I wardrive:

On another turbo-geek note, I broke down and went with the guys from work to Best Buy after lunch. I bought both Episode II (Widescreen) and Lord of the RIngs (Extended Edition). I know, I’m weak. But I have a feeble excuse… Michele had never seen Episode II and she is watching it now, as I type for the first time.
Long day. Tomorrow is longer. Time to rest.

I forgot to mention that I finally got a chance to watch the movie Legend of 1900. I had caught part of the movie on TV and wasn’t able to find the DVD for a while. Recently I noticed the netflix had it and added it to the queue.
I enjoyed the movie. It has some great moments, but felt like a bit was missing. Roger Ebert has a good review of it. It’s definitely worth a viewing.
My toying with wardriving continues. From my office I can hit 15+ WAPs with the new antenna. I also realized that Starbucks turned on a Boingo access point in the lobby of our building. I need to do a little more research to see what the BOingo system is all about. If you are wardriving and come across the SSID of ‘tmobile’, it the Boingo system.
I’m pondering songs for my next MeFi swap. I need to be original. No more leaning on my old standbys.

Battlefield 1942 is available at newegg for $19.95.
That is below any price barrier you could hope for…
Buy it now!

I’ll make this brief, it’s late, Michele’s sick, and the bed is calling my name.
I finished my page on building a cantenna for 802.11 wardriving.
Enjoy.
Put this t-shirt on my Hanukah/Christmas/Festivus list. I need it.

The rain continues to fall here in LA. Last night I made cookies with the girls.

Yes, it looks like play-do, but it’s not. The cookie dough comes in various colors and you get to mix the dough into different shapes before you bake it. The girls & I had fun. Unfortunately, the cookies didn’t taste so good. I spinkled sugar on the second batch and it was much better.
I didn’t leave the house today. I spent the morning building an antenna for the wardriving. Yes, I’ve got the bug to try out wardriving again. I’ll write up the story tomorrow.
In the mean time, someone please buy me this space suit.

Today started out wonderfully. It was raining all night and when I awoke, the rain was still pounding. The girls climbed into bed with Michele & me to snuggle and listen to the rain fall.
One of the strange attributes of Southern California denizens is that we actually like it rains, especially the first big rain of the year. I can’t explain why, but it happens. Even people born elsewhere begin to feel this way after living in SoCal for a while.
Yesterday, that the infamous 4×4 lunch, I even talked about the joy of climbing up the ladder in the rain to clear the leaves from the rain gutter.
Today I had the pleasure of actually doing it. Much to Michele’s chagrin, I climbed up the ladder in my good raincoat and tossed the leaves blocking the drain onto the lawn. The satisfying woosh sound told me it was going to be a good day.
Work was OK. My meeting load was at a minimum and I was able to actually get some work done. I had a good trip at lunch to the electronics store and then to Poquito Mas.
The book I’m reading,
Declare, is really getting going. After 200 pages of Ludlum style spy tradecraft, the magic side of the story is kicking in. It’s cool stuff. I’d say more, but that might ruin it.


Cool graphic from Amazon, eh?

Today after a trip to Ikea on the lunch hour, Brad, Chris, Pat and I stopped at In ‘n Out Burger for lunch. In my last two visits, I have consumed 3×3 burgers. At the suggestion of Brad & Chris, I tried a 4×4. That’s a burger with 4 patties and 4 slices of cheese. in ‘in Out will make them as big as you want. Brad and Chris tried the 3x3s and were also surprised how easy it was to eat those.
Amazingly, the burger went down smoothly. The 5×5 seems easily doable.
Where will the madness end?