I apologize if I've been distant lately; right now I'm in the process of rebooting my life.
Friday will be my last day with IBM.
Over the next few weeks I'll be relocating to the Bay Area to work for Google.
In General
Posted at 11:25 PM | Permanent link
In General
Posted at 11:29 PM | Permanent link
7:48:46 PM [anonymous-friend]: ok
7:48:48 PM [anonymous-friend]: man question
7:49:22 PM joshstaiger: no manual entry for question
7:49:27 PM joshstaiger: ok, that was bad
In General, Technology and Software
Posted at 11:21 PM | Permanent link
Here's something you can try at home:
These are some photos I took during a trip to NYC with my brother Sam and sister Eliza way back in January.
New York, New York - January 2006 Photoset
(check the photoset - there's lots more)
Great fun.
In General
Posted at 08:16 AM | Permanent link
So there's this engineer on a cruise ship in the Caribbean for the first time. It was wonderful - the time of his life.
A hurricane came up unexpectedly and the ship went down.
The man found himself swept up on the shore of an island. He looked around. Nothing but bananas and coconuts. He was forlorn, but decided to make the best of it. For the next four months he ate bananas, drank coconut juice, and looked to the sea for a ship to come to his rescue.
One day, while he was stroking his beard, staring off into the horizon, he spotted movement out of the corner of his eye. Could it be true, was it a ship? No... But from around the corner of the island came a rowboat. In it was the most beautiful woman he'd ever seen. She was tall, thin, tanned, and her blond hair flowed in the sea breeze, giving her an ethereal quality. She spotted him waving and screaming and rowed over.
"Where did you come from? How did you get here?", he asked.
"I rowed from the other side of the island. I landed on this island when my cruise ship sank."
"Amazing! I didn't know anyone else survived. How many of you are there? You must have been really lucky to have a rowboat wash up with you?"
"It's only me", she said, "and the rowboat didn't wash up - nothing did."
"Err, then how did you get the boat?"
"Oh, I made the rowboat out of raw material I found on the island", replied the woman. "I whittled the oars from branches, wove the bottom from palms, and molded the sides and stern from eucalyptus."
"But, what about tools and hardware? How did you do that?"
"No problem, on the south side of the island there's an unusual stratum of alluvial rock. If I fire it to a certain temperature it melts into forgeable ductile iron. I used that for tools, and used the tools to make the hardware. Where do you live?"
"Err... well... I've been sleeping on the beach...."
"Oh... well let's row over to my place", she said. So they got into the rowboat and left for her side of island.
She rowed around to a wharf, tied the rowboat with a beautifully woven hemp rope and they walked up a stone path where there stood an exquisite bungalow painted in blue and white.
"It's not much, but it's home. Sit down. Would you like a drink?"
"Ugh, sorry... one more coconut juice and I'll puke."
"Oh, not coconut juice. I have a still - how about a Pina Colada?"
"Well... errr... yeah... of course... that'd be wonderful", said the man, trying to hide his amazement.
They sat on her couch and talked. After a while they had exchanged stories, and the woman asked, "Have you always had a beard?"
"No, I was clean shaven all of my life, even on the cruise."
"Well if you'd like a shave, there's a razor upstairs in the bathroom." So the man, no longer questioning anything, went upstairs to the bathroom. There in the cabinet was a razor made from a bone handle and two shells honed to a hollow ground edge. He shaved, showered and went back downstairs.
"You look great", said the woman, "I think I'll go up and slip into something more comfortable." So she did.
After a time, the woman returned wearing nothing but strategically positioned fig leaves, and smelling faintly of gardenia.
"Tell me," she said, sexily, "we've both been out here a long time with no companionship. Have you been lonely? Is there anything you miss? Something all men and woman need? Something that would be really nice to have right now?"
"Oh, there certainly is...", the man replied.
He moved closer and fixed his gaze upon her.
"Tell me.... Can I check my email from here?"
~~~~
(Adapted from a random internet hero)
Last week while vacationing in Virginia Beach, I found myself in a similarly disconnected state and was reminded of this joke.
Although I have to admit, it's nice to get away from the instant messaging and angle brackets for a bit. But the email backlog is a pain in my ass.
Unfortunately in 2006, even if a nerd could check his email from the sexy fig lady's house, he'd find 90% of his inbox filled with chinese hello kitty sex toy spam.
It seems even the best minds in the industry are struggling with the spam problem nowadays.
Although, frankly, I'm not sure why Gmail has a hard time recognizing I have no interest in emails consisting only of chinese characters, nor announcements I've won 30 million euros, nor emails with only image attachments and no message body (from random people).
But apparently it's hard.
In General
Posted at 10:59 PM | Permanent link
Twenty-five today :) Made it to the quarter century mark.
Thanks for all the well wishes, everyone!
Birthday archive:
(I didn't have a birthday in 2004 because the web server was down)
In General
Posted at 05:17 PM | Permanent link
Do you ever wander through your old blog posts thinking "Wow, I wrote that! Was I really that clever!?"
It's one of the best parts about blogging. You can track your descent into senility one post at a time.
Except it doesn't work unless you actually write, which I haven't been doing. So there's going to be a large gap in my record where I look like a boy wonder at the tender young age of 24 years and ten months, but a raving lunatic at 25 (minus one day).
Anyway, I'm back. I wanted to write something, anything to get the ball rolling again. Luckily the hard part is over now, because if there's one thing I've learned about writing, it's that writing has inertia. Writing spawns more writing which spawns more writing (recurse (recurse ( recurse...))) until there are nights when you can't go to bed because there are so many ideas you want to write down...
But unfortunately the opposite is also true. Not writing makes you want to write less and less ... and less.
So let's just try this and see how it works out shall we?
One short update. During my hiatus I accepted a spiffy new job within IBM. I'm not sure what I'm allowed to say about it yet, but for hints, read Bill's blog :)
The new job involves a lot of advanced Ajax programming using Dojo (Dojo rocks), so I've been spending a lot of time thinking in Javascript, which is loads more fun than thinking in Java.
Oh, and coincidentally I've been studying Jazz piano too. Small world, eh?
Posted at 07:05 AM | Permanent link
So this is Silicon Valley...
The weather in San Jose is beautiful. The mountain Backdrop is just as I picture it... as are the miles upon miles of strip malls and car dealerships.
Y Combinator held a reception for select Startup School attendees earlier this evening. This included large metal robots. My voice is hoarse from talking with so many interesting people.
It's 1:30AM PDT. I'm so focking tired. Mmm jet lag.
It's been a long, but good day. I'm going to go pass out now.
In General
Posted at 04:41 AM | Permanent link
Headed out to Wilmington this past weekend with friends to visit Ashish during his family med rotation.
Perfect weather, sand, and waves make a great atmosphere for leaving your cares behind... at least for a little while.
As usual, I got a tan (I tan like nobody's business).
A sample exchange from this weekend:
Lisa: "So I'm bringing my Thunder[something] toy and P-Puss to the beach"
"Wait a minute, what was that second thing?"
"P-Puss"
"What's that?"
"I'll show you when we get to the beach."
"Ok, I don't know what that means, but it sounds dirty."
"You boys have dirty minds."
(me, Lisa, Krupal, and P(laty)Pus)
I don't know why, but we somehow decided it would be a good idea to drink over a gallon of Yoohoo amongst the four of us for lunch on Sunday. If I don't taste another drop of Yoohoo for the rest of my life, I think it'll be too soon...
Other photos:
And more on Flickr...
In General
Posted at 10:59 PM | Permanent link
(Ben Folds, Raleigh, 3/30/2006)
I'm often amused at kickass concerts large and small how most people can stand like a sticks with nary a head-bob or foot tap or ass jiggle to be seen.
Are people too cool to feel the music as it washes over them? Or do white people really not have any rhythm as a general rule?
Hmm... I'm rockin' the suburbs?
In General
Posted at 12:57 AM | Permanent link
On a whim yesterday I decided to head to Greensboro with Eileen to catch round two of the NCAA tourney.
That was a blast!
Well, except for that the bit where I decided to drive 30 miles in the wrong direction (despite Eileen's best efforts to right me)... wouldn't it be nice if life had an undo button? Aye...
But anyway - bought a ticket from a scalper to get in and got to see two games:
All in all, a lovely way to spend a March afternoon in basketball country :)
In General
Posted at 11:23 PM | Permanent link
This morning I happened across Mark Osborne's animated short: More.
You can watch the full six minutes in its entirety here.
Eerily good, I say.
In General
Posted at 04:46 PM | Permanent link
Happy (effing) Valentine's day!
(from pbf)
In General
Posted at 07:22 AM | Permanent link
...
10:00:30 PM joshstaiger: I'm not. Right now I think that lisp and cocoa are a lot sexier than any woman I've ever met.
10:00:46 PM joshstaiger: Well, maybe not, but they sure are a lot less of a pain in the ass.
10:02:54 PM quinnie0930: lol
10:03:20 PM quinnie0930: you're hilarious
...
In General
Posted at 10:27 PM | Permanent link
The links we make.
My latest guilty web pleasures are Rojo and Reddit.
Rojo is a web-based feed aggregator, similar to bloglines, but with a slicker user interface and more tagging functionality. ...although I'm starting to suspect that it is having trouble reading Atom 1.0 feeds, which is a bummer because that's the reason I started looking for "not bloglines" in the first place.
Reddit is one of the Y-Combinator SFP startups. It's a user-driven web content "sifting" system that seems to be quite good at getting the best articles to rise to the top. I've known about Reddit for quite some time, but only recently have I really become addicted to it.
In other news...
The College Theme Paper: He vs. She: Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus.
Rebecca: Asshole.
Gary: Bitch.
Rebecca: Wanker.
Gary: Slut.
Rebecca: Get f****d.
Gary: Eat s**t.
Man Finds Diamond Ring In His Unlocked Car: The note says, "Merry Christmas. Thank you for leaving your car door unlocked. Instead of stealing your car I gave you a present. Hopefully this will land in the hands of someone you love, for my love is gone now. Merry Christmas to you."
Love. Fucking. Blows.
Ohio Man Convicted of Murder for Shooting Rampage at Case Western Reserve University: Remember that dickhead who decided to shoot up our school on the last day of finals in 2003? He's getting his.
Bush takes questions from an unscreened audience: Oh, to live in a world where this would not come as a shock...
Come Celebrate the Joy of Programming, with the World's Most Unbureaucratic Computers: An essay written in 1986 by RMS. Very interesting history of the MIT AI Lab, the AI Lab culture, and the Lisp wars of the 1980s. Even cooler when you get down to the last few paragraphs.
I cannot work for LMI, even though they are willing to let my work be partly public. I can make compromises in fighting a war, but when it comes to building something good such compromise is useless, since it would make whatever I build fail to be good...Instead I have chosen an ambitious project that strikes at the root of the way that the commercial, hostile way of life is maintained...I start on Thanksgiving...
Vijay, the world's most desperate venture capitalist: Ah, startup humor.
Google's new anti-phishing FireFox extension may expose a security hole: Apparently this is also true of the PageRank feature of Google Toolbar.
In General
Posted at 01:41 AM | Permanent link
Last weekend I took a trip down to Atlanta to visit the new Georgia Aquarium, which apparently is, like, the largest aquarium in the world (badass).
It was a tiring weekend, but fun.
More photos here.
In General
Posted at 12:20 AM | Permanent link
Ladies and gentlemen, the George W. Ernst blog...
(if you studied Computer Science at Case, you'll find this to be wildly hilarious; otherwise move along, nothing to see here)
In General
Posted at 11:39 PM | Permanent link
Is Google opening up operations in RTP? Maybe, according to Marketing Pilgrim.
(via Sam Ruby)
Posted at 06:28 PM | Permanent link
This is wicked cool.... So is this....
(slightly not safe for work on both)
More here.
Especially if you're into drawing. I can't even describe it. Just go watch them. I only wish that I could read Russian.
(via Tim Bray)
In General
Posted at 10:28 PM | Permanent link
I've decided that the weather in North Carolina isn't nearly miserable enough this time of year. Therefore, I'll be in Cleveland for Thanksgiving. I'll be in town until Saturday. If you're a Cleveland peep, give me a call.
Tonight: Periods of snow. Low near 26. Breezy, with a south wind 16 to 26 mph becoming west. Winds could gust as high as 37 mph. Chance of precipitation is 90%. New snow accumulation of 1 to 3 inches possible.
In General
Posted at 07:59 PM | Permanent link
Heading to New York tomorrow on business. This will be the first time I've been to the city (yes, I realize how shocking that is). Whee! :)
In General
Posted at 11:37 PM | Permanent link
I wrote this a few hours ago:
I'm sitting in the airport now, waiting to catch my flight to Boston for the Startup School conference.
Right now I think that if my plane were to go down in flames, I'd die happy :)
(note: my plane didn't go down in flames, although it was delayed by an hour due to nasty weather in the Northeast)
In General
Posted at 07:16 PM | Permanent link
To mirror dive into mark:
Then they will answer and say, 'Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or ill or in prison, and not minister to your needs?'...
He will answer them, 'Amen, I say to you, what you did not do for one of these least ones, you did not do for me.'
And these will go off to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life."
Matthew 25
Please help the victims of the recent earthquake in Southern Asia.
In General
Posted at 09:49 PM | Permanent link
I've been unable to stop listening to the Gorillaz ever since I grabbed their newest album, Demon Days.
Check out the music video for Feel Good Inc at AOL Music. Good stuff!
In General
Posted at 02:11 AM | Permanent link
Skipping town today to join my family for a week's worth of R&R in Sarasota, Florida.
Ahh, no TPS reports.
In General
Posted at 08:00 AM | Permanent link
I love this photo:
courtesy Philip Greenspun
In General
Posted at 08:57 PM | Permanent link
If you sent me any mail (snail mail) between August 1st and August 14th it's found it's way to /dev/null. At least I've given up hope of ever seeing it.
Apparently the USPS was just kidding when they confirmed they were holding my mail for those dates, and the supervisor of the Hilburn USPS station in Raleigh was just kidding when she told me that the mail had been forwarded and would be delivered to my new address in seven to ten days.
Shocking, I know, that a US government-run organization can fuck things up. Because that never happens.
In General
Posted at 01:13 AM | Permanent link
I saw the movie Broken Flowers this past week when Renee came to town.
Let's be clear. Normally I'm a big fan of artsy movies, but this movie blows.
The movie features Bill Murray playing a rich, retired computer professional. With quotes like, "I was into computers and girls. And you?", what could go wrong?
I'll tell you what can go wrong. Fully half of the movie consists of the main character sitting with a blank expression, doing nothing. Oh, scratch that, sometimes he's driving in his car with a blank expression, doing nothing. You'd think I'm exaggerating, but sadly no.
Looking around the blogosphere, it seems that a lot of older male computer professionals really enjoyed this movie.
Perhaps this is a corrolary to the principle that Steve Martin SNL skits and Jay Leno become wildly hilarious if you were born prior to 1965. Maybe I'm just too young to appreciate boredom.
What the fuck is this 88%? Rotten Tomatoes, you disappoint me.
In General
Posted at 08:52 PM | Permanent link
"Several years ago, Raleigh North Carolina was hit by a freak hurricane called Fran that came much further inland than anyone expected. I happened to live in Raleigh at the time. Fran shut the city down for about two weeks. Now, watching from the sidelines as 90,000 square miles of the gulf coast recovers from Katrina, what is coming to mind is a check list for things your family needs "after a hurricane" or other big disaster like that."
Check out the full article.
In General
Posted at 08:28 AM | Permanent link
This is my life, too. (Thanks, Russ Beatie!)
Too Much Coffee Man is my most favorite new comic since the PBF.
RSS feed available here!
In General
Posted at 05:50 PM | Permanent link
Now that the dust has settled a bit and I've confirmed that I'm receiving mail at my new address, I should probably announce that I've moved.
I'll be living with Ashish in a brand new house in North Durham, and I use the term "Ashish" loosely because as a second year medical student he's either at the hospital or sleeping 90% of the time.
The commute to work is kind of a bitch, but being five minutes from 9th Street, Duke, and the new American Tobacco district is nice...so long as I can manage to avoid being killed by gang violence.
I've updated the contact page with my new address:
Josh Staiger
707 Weeping Willow Dr.
Durham, NC 27704
This address doesn't yet show up on google maps, but here is a good approximation. I'll post directions soon.
My old 919 phone number is going away, but you can still get ahold of me on my cell: 216-570-8595 (I really should change this to a North Carolina number one of these days, but for the moment have no plans to do so).
Thus far we're still leaching wireless internet access off the neighbors next door (if you happen to be my neighbors please stop by so I can apologize). It's a huge pain, so new entries might be few and far between for a bit.
In General
Posted at 05:33 PM | Permanent link
I respect women. I respect them so much that I completely stay away from them.
On Saturday, weary from unpacking boxes, I headed out to Southpoint to catch a showing of The 40 Year-Old Virgin.
Best decision of the weekend. I laughed until I cried.
With a title like "The 40 Year-Old Virgin" one would come to expect a myriad of raunchy sex jokes, and the movie certainly delivers. But unlike many comedies in this genre there's a surprising intelligence and wittiness to the humor (think Daily Show, rather than Anchorman).
Steve Carell is shaping up to be quite a fine comic actor.
I liked Virgin even better than The Wedding Crashers, which is high praise given that I also enjoyed that movie a great deal. Very much recommended.
In General
Posted at 08:36 AM | Permanent link
I just finished the latest installment of the Harry Potter series: Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince.
In a word: wow! I didn't see that ending coming. I somewhat guessed the character who was going to die, but I didn't think it would happen like that!
If you've read the book, let's talk about it.
I'll be posting further thoughts in the comments to this entry. If you haven't yet read the book, I'd recommend you avoid them.
Technorati tags: Harry Potter
In General, Matters that are otherwise worthwhile
Posted at 07:50 AM | Permanent link
...
3. Go to the bookstore and locate its copies of George Orwell's 1984. Unless the Ministry of Reshelving has already visited this bookstore, it is probably currently incorrectly classified as "Fiction" or "Literature."
4. Discreetly move all copies of 1984 to a more suitable section, such as "Current Events", "Politics", "History", "True Crime", or "New Non-Fiction."
...
The Ministry of Reshelving Project
In General
Posted at 10:18 PM | Permanent link
Twenty-four today. Here's to another good year.
In General
Posted at 07:42 PM | Permanent link
The New York Times is reporting that studies show the popular herbal supplement, Echinacea, to have no effect in preventing or treating colds.
"We should assume that echinacea does not work until somebody proves it does," he said. That, he added, "is the flip side of where we've been."
For some time now I've bought into the notion that Echinacea helps stave off the common cold, and have been taking it accordingly. I guess this puts a stop to that.
Although, I often wonder if I wouldn't be better off maintaining my ignorance of such subjects in order to preserve any placebo effect that I might be gaining the benefit of.
Any resident med / epidemiology students care to comment?
Here is the original news release from the Infectious Disease Society of America:
Echinacea Fails to Block Cold Virus Infection
In General
Posted at 11:55 PM | Permanent link
From the latest Perry Bible Fellowship strip:
In General
Posted at 12:02 AM | Permanent link
"Why is a dog asking me questions?
Who's been putting the mescaline in the Microsoft kool aid?
What if google used this approach?
Would google still be number one?"
via Joel!
In General
Posted at 08:30 PM | Permanent link
I arrived in Cleveland last night after getting bumped from my original flight and having to take a detour through Detroit.
Unlike my experience at Christmas, this time around Continental was very apologetic and sent me on my way with $400 worth of free flights.
Anyway, I'm taking some time off and will be spending the 4th of July holiday and the rest of next week in Cleveland. I'll be in town until Saturday, July 10th. If you're still in the area, let's get together: 216-570-8595. I'd love to see ya.
In General
Posted at 05:47 PM | Permanent link
Three foreigners: a businessman, physicist, and mathematician, are talking about the country they're all visiting for the first time.
Suddenly, the businessman points out the window in surprise. "Look at that! The sheep in Scotland are black!"
Amused at how readily his new friend jumps to conclusions, the physicist corrects him: "No, all we can be certain of is that some of the sheep in Scotland are black."
The mathematician looks out the window himself, and corrects the both of them: "We know there exists a sheep in Scotland which is black on at least one side."
In General
Posted at 12:12 AM | Permanent link
"When I was 17 I read a quote that went something like, "If you live each day as if it was your last, someday you'll most certainly be right." It made an impression on me, and since then, for the past 33 years, I have looked in the mirror every morning and asked myself, "If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?" And whenever the answer has been "no" for too many days in a row, I know I need to change something."
In General
Posted at 11:34 PM | Permanent link
9:49:28 PM joshstaiger: wtf
9:49:36 PM joshstaiger: since when is sherbert spelled sherbet
9:49:47 PM edawg1701: since always
9:49:56 PM joshstaiger: no r at the end?
9:49:59 PM joshstaiger: wtf is up with that?
9:50:29 PM edawg1701: I think it can have the r in the alternative
9:51:28 PM joshstaiger: yeah according to wikipedia both variants are used
9:51:46 PM joshstaiger: supposedly sherbet is british
9:51:51 PM joshstaiger: sherbert is australian
9:51:57 PM joshstaiger: and either one is used in the US
9:52:43 PM edawg1701: don't forget about sorbet
9:52:59 PM joshstaiger: yeah but sorbet is different
9:53:08 PM edawg1701: no milk
9:53:19 PM joshstaiger: yeah but sherbert doesn't have milk either
9:53:28 PM joshstaiger: but I think the sorbet is icier
9:53:47 PM edawg1701: sherbert can have milk
9:53:51 PM joshstaiger: oh yeah I guess you're right
9:53:57 PM joshstaiger: it can but not necessarily
9:54:03 PM edawg1701: yea
In General
Posted at 08:49 PM | Permanent link
"For any man who has been dumped or divorced by a woman reflecting on Scott Peterson ought to be a humbling experience. Consider that Scott was beloved by both his wife, a beautiful and kind person, and his massage therapist girlfriend. This despite the fact that Scott was an adulterer and murderer, both black marks against a person's character. So the only reasonable conclusion that a rejected man can draw is that he is less attractive, as a package, than Scott Peterson."
From Flying over Scott Peterson's House.
In General
Posted at 07:58 PM | Permanent link
"Remember that. If you start a startup, you'll probably fail. Most startups fail. It's the nature of the business. But it's not necessarily a mistake to try something thas has a 90% chance of failing, if you can afford the risk. Failing at 40, when you have a family to support, could be serious. But if you fail at 22, so what? If you try to start a startup right out of college and it tanks, you'll end up at 23 broke and a lot smarter. Which, if you think about it, is roughly what you hope to get from a graduate program."
From Hiring is Obsolete
In General
Posted at 09:37 PM | Permanent link
Last night, I decided to investigate the origins of Hugbot, and I ended up discovering the Perry Bible Fellowship series of comics by Nicholas Gurewitch.
I'm not sure that it gets any better than this. :)
There's even an RSS feed!
In General
Posted at 06:44 PM | Permanent link
"Starbucks announced today that it will not sell Bruce Springsteen's new album, 'Devils and Dust,' because one of the songs is too graphic. Starbucks said, 'We don't want people listening to a song about getting screwed while they're paying nine dollars for a cup of coffee.'"
In General
Posted at 10:32 PM | Permanent link
What is 24 hour comics day?
This is an everest I need to climb at some point in my life. Maybe next year.
In General
Posted at 06:13 PM | Permanent link
Given that my daily commute takes under ten minutes, I mostly only listen to podcasts while taking walks.
In the winter this can be a problem, not so much because of the temperature, as because of the lack of daylight. Now that it no longer gets dark at 5pm, I've been able to enjoy Umstead Park more often and listen to more podcasts as a side effect.
Here are some of the excellent talks that I had missed out on this winter, each only has a cursory relation to computers and technology, so non-techies should find them interesting as well:
