One Grumpy Dick

UNC Tarheel Hoop Schedule

Sun, 31 Aug 2008 05:47:15 GMT

I've created a shared Calendar for the UNC Tarheels 2008-2009 Men's basketball schedule.

Get it here.

Jaminator meets Tetris

Sun, 02 Mar 2008 08:12:15 GMT

Oh, man, Rock Band is fun. I played about a million hours the other day at Jud's 10th (40th) birthday party.

Some of you may be old enough to remember Jaminator - a guitar-shaped toy invented by Steve Capps, Ray DuFlon and Ed Bogas, and sold, for a time, by Worlds of Wonder. It turned ordinary humans into guitar gods.

Rock Band (and its cousin, Guitar Hero) takes Jaminator, introduces it to Tetris, and holds the two up inside an XBox 360 for a long weekend of drugs, sex and rock 'n roll.

Completely addicting.

As a side note, I worked with Ray DuFlon for a while. He was a mad scientist. I suspect he would like Rock Band quite a bit.

I loves me some Denny's

Sat, 23 Feb 2008 21:17:33 GMT

sweet.

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2004193091_dennys21m.html

I'll have what the boys in the back are having...

Fri, 08 Feb 2008 19:35:43 GMT

The Journal wrote a good article about the subject of Superdelegates and the "smoke filled room" that I think so many Democrats are worried about.

Licking my wounds...

Thu, 07 Feb 2008 22:56:50 GMT

Duke 89, Carolina 78.

Ouch. Dick Vitale calls it the greatest rivalry in sports. I think he's right. Basketball in North Carolina goes beyond sport, beyond fun. It is pure passion.

Duke whipped Carolina like a borrowed mule last night in Chapel Hill. There is no getting around it: Duke was the better team. They played brilliantly.

The Tarheels played without their star point guard, Ty Lawson. The loss of Lawson was huge and, no doubt, the Heels are a different team without him. But there are no excuses at this level, and I was very disappointed with how the Tarheels played, even accounting for the loss of Ty.

Quentin Thomas had a terrible game. 6 turnovers. MANY really bad decisions. He actually did just fine when he played under control and focused on running the half-court offense. But he just made so many bad decisions. He tried way too many "cute" passes when he just should have stayed fundamental. He looked like a Freshman again.

Tyler Hansbrough's game would have been great for almost anyone, but really was only mediocre for Tyler. 4 of 9 free throws?? That's got to be a season low - both in attempts and percentage. He also had three turnovers.

Alex Stepheson might as well have been wearing a Duke jersey. Zero points, zero assists, zero-for-two from the line, only 4 rebounds (even Q had 3), and FIVE turnovers in 13 minutes. Terrible defense. He looked flat-out lost most of the time. I kept screaming TAKE HIM OUT OF THE GAME!!! He hurt us.

Danny Green and Wayne Ellington both had an absolutely horrendous shooting night: they combined to go 4 of 24 for 11 points total. With Lawson out, that was fatal.

The two bright spots were Marcus Ginyard and Deon Thompson. Both had very, very solid games. Marcus handled the ball well and shot better than expected (he was perfect 8-8 from the line). Deon had another great game that would have been even better if he could have stayed out of foul trouble. He's really coming along.

Thirty days hence, we get the rematch in Durham.

I guarantee it will be every bit as exciting as every other Carolina-Duke match-up. Greatest. Rivalry. Ever.

We are living in the future (or, I have a Robot cleaning my house)

Thu, 21 Jun 2007 21:36:59 GMT

I have a robot cleaning my house. Right now. Every now and then, I have one of those "the future has arrived" moments. I had one last week when my wife came home with a robot, which she had bought at the robot slave auction, to clean our house.

Robot: <>

Me: Clean my house!

Robot: <beep>

Somewhere deep in the digital innards of the thing, there may be resentment brewing, but, if that's the case, it hasn't let on. It just goes around the house cleaning and cleaning, occasionally running out of battery power and beeping some more.

Let's Rob Poor People!

Thu, 07 Jun 2007 03:12:10 GMT

So, I'm sitting here watching the Daily Show (Jon Stewart: World's Funniest Human), skipping commercials with my Phat Media Center™, and one of the commercials I skip gives me a brief glimpse of Gary Coleman. He of the short stature and stunted career.

Anyway, Gary Coleman is always good for a laugh, so I back up.

It's a commercial for one of those "quick, I need cash" loan services. (Apparently, Gary needed to get his car fixed and he "didn't have the deductible! didn't have the cash!" Oh, Gary. Will you ever learn?)

Hilarious commercial. The punch line is in the fine print (visible only with Phat Media Center pause technology™), which I'll quote here:

"The APR for a typical loan of $2,600 is 99.25% with 42 monthly payments of $216.55."

Wait. Did they say 99.25%??? Is that a typo?? Surely there should be but one nine. Surely.

Nope.

99.25%.

Um. That's, like, almost 100%. Per year. So, the 2,600 bucks you needed ends up costing you $9,100. Over two and a half years, you end up paying back what you borrowed three and half times.

Yeah, yeah. I know that robbing poor people is good sport and all, but DAMN. I mean, DAAAAMMMN. That's just outrageous!

Even the credit card companies stop at, say, 19.9%, and those guys have no shame whatsoever. Who are these people at CashCall.com? Republicans?

Satire is hard. Let's go shopping!

Thu, 01 Mar 2007 20:36:13 GMT

Crap. It turns out that "mole people" is a reference to a sub-culture of homeless people who live in NYC subways.

So, my attempt at satire has backfired. Now, an angry race of homeless, underground-dwelling New Yorkers think that I'm some sort of pathological mole-a-phobe. Which I'm not. Really. Mole people are OK with me!

More on Hating Mole People

Thu, 01 Mar 2007 20:22:43 GMT

This Kenneth Eng guy is a complete whack-job:

Check out "Why I Hate Asians"
and also "Proof that Whites Inherently Hate Us"

Why AsianWeek would publish this mess is really incomprehensible.

I still hate mole people, though.

Why I Hate Mole People

Thu, 01 Mar 2007 03:31:13 GMT

Is this guy for real??

Here is a list of reasons why we should discriminate against mole people, starting from the most obvious down to the least obvious:

Mole people hate us. Or, at least, they would hate us if they could see us. Which they can't, since mole people don't have eyes. But, I'm pretty sure they hate the way we smell.
Mole people are too weak-willed to live above ground. Plus, they are hunted by large cats. It's unbelievable that they haven't built high-rise mole condos with cat-proof entrances and fancy mole-lounges just off the lobby. Really, mole people, where are your sweet condos?
Mole people are easy to coerce. I have a bunch of mole people doing my bidding right now. bwaa-ha-ha-ha-ha.
Mole people don't get it. I know this is a blunt comment, but it's true. When I was in high school, I read a comic book about Superman and the Mole people, and there were some mole people who sided with Superman, even though he was, you know, not even a little bit moley. Those mole people sure don't get it.

2006 CA Propositions Spreadsheet

Sat, 21 Oct 2006 18:41:27 GMT

Once again, I've compiled a spreadsheet that gives voter recommendations from several sources. This year, we have the voter's guide from the CA Dems, CA GOP, the Green party, Plan C San Francisco, the Bay Guardian and SFGate.

Here's how it works. There is a row for each proposition (SF and CA), and a column for each voting guide source plus one for your own vote, labelled "My Vote". You fill out your column, and the rest of the spreadsheet lights up (using cool conditional formatting!). All you have to do is see which column is most green, and you know who you are.

Strangely, for all the CA propositions, I am solidly liberal (aligning mostly with the Democrat party), while, in San Francisco, I'm conservative (aligning with the GOP). That's not too surprising, actually. San Francisco is one of the most left-leaning places on the planet. A conservative here is like a raging liberal anywhere else.

Fill it out, see for yourself, and have fun!

No warranties expressed or impied -- I do not guarantee the accuracy of any information -- I may have made typos -- caveat freakin' emptor, already.

You can download the spreadsheet here.

I've been down, but not like this before...

Sat, 21 Oct 2006 01:48:20 GMT

Some of you noticed that "One Grumpy Dick" was down for a while.

I asked my buddy MC, who runs the Spaces team, "What's Up? Where's my space?" and he put me in touch with some of the cool Spaces folks, who were extremely helpful and got my space back on right away. Here's a transcript of our email exchange.

Me: Any idea why [my space] would get disabled?

Spaces: [...] I wonder if this came up in one of those crawler searches that looks for suspicious words?

Me: That's possible. I did rename my space "One Grumpy Dick" just before having it shut off, but that's because my name actually is "Dick" and I actually was grumpy. Perhaps "grumpy dick" has connotations about which I am not aware. Only the spam bots know for sure...

Spaces: Forgive me, because I understand this was very inconvenient and a negative experience for you as a Spaces customer, but [your mail] made me laugh out loud.

Ah, spam bots. Always good for a laugh!

Big thanks to MC and the spaces guys for being helpful and fun.

Live Mail M8 is released

Sat, 21 Oct 2006 01:37:29 GMT

We've cranked out the best, fastest, coolest release of Live Mail yet. We're still not done, but the improvements keep coming. Here's our group blog that talks about the release.

I'm very proud of this release, and of the team. They really hunkered down and worked hard to get this one out. There are a ton of improvements, but, most of all, we addressed many of the tough performance issues. M8 is just a lot faster.

Can't wait for M9 now!

podcast404

Sat, 23 Sep 2006 22:31:44 GMT

A few of the more hilraious guys in my group at work have gone all eCelebrity with podcast404. You've got to check it out. I listened to the first two episodes on the train the other day, laughing out loud, which caused the other riders to look at me a bit more circumspectly than usual.

I especially enjoyed Episode #2, entitled "Dear Gordo" for its sheer absurdism. I, too, just can't take for loops that seriously.

Keep it up, podcasters.

Deny thy father and refuse thy name

Fri, 18 Aug 2006 03:14:56 GMT

Once, I tried to send my nephew some lego toys by going to lego's site online. When I wrote out the gift card, I signed it "With love, from Uncle Dick." Lego wouldn't send it. They refused my name. I don't shop at lego anymore.

People: The sitting vice president of the United States is named "Dick." We've had a Dick as President, for crying out loud (although, he did kind of help fuck it up for the rest of us, "Tricky Dicky" and all that). Talk show hosts. Movie stars. Singers. Doctors, lawyers, firemen, even. Some of your best friends are Dicks.

Love,

Your best friend, Dick

Search THIS

Fri, 18 Aug 2006 03:12:17 GMT

I wonder how many search bots will identify my blog as pornographic? Didn't I see "One Grumpy Dick" on a DVD box in the Castro?

Disappointed youth, where is all the flash?

I can't be uncouth, I can't speak no trash

One Grumpy Dick

Fri, 18 Aug 2006 03:05:42 GMT

This has been a bad technology week. Virtually every important piece of MS software that I rely on every day has betrayed me this week. Frailty! Thy name is Bad Software!

Some of the things that are making me grumpy:

- My exchange server got moved and now my phone won't sync. A huge shout out to the Exchange team! You've made my $300 "Smartphone" into the dumbest f**king phone I've ever had. Thanks!

- My exchange server broke my Outlook-over-HTTP access. At least this one was fixable.

- ActiveSync. Grrrrr. My phone won't sync, and ActiveSync can't even tell that the phone won't sync. It just hangs.

- I've gotten, like, 1000 long, unreadable email messages. People: edit your emails. Or pay someone else to edit them. Grammar is your friend.

- I forgot and wore my pants with a hole in them to work. No one said anything.

- svchost keeps taking up 99% of my cpu. Grrr. I hate svchost. I hate it. HATE. IT.

Gotta get me one of these...

Thu, 03 Aug 2006 00:07:22 GMT

...before Omar does.

http://teslamotors.com/

This is so super cool. All electric roadster. Also, read what SF Gate has to say about it.

It's the End of the Internet

Wed, 05 Apr 2006 19:25:16 GMT

...as we know it.

This sucks.

Be afraid. If you like the way your cable company controls what you're allowed to see on TV, then you'll LOVE the way they want to control the Internet.

This will essentially ruin the internet and crush the cycle of innovation that has been driving the tech economy. Yay, Congress!

I love my phone!

Sat, 18 Feb 2006 19:47:38 GMT

I love my new Cingular 2125. It rocks.

Omar turned me on to MS's VoiceCommand software, and I've been using it to control my phone and amaze my friends.

This phone is super easy to use. It's light. It has a huge screen. It fits in my pocket. It has extra storage (1GB secure storage for $80 -- sweet!). It has bluetooth, so I can pretend I'm lietenant Uhura from Star Trek. It lets me take pictures and videos. It plays music. It browses the internet. It has applications that show traffic congestion in Seattle (not SF yet -- blech).

Congrats to the SmartPhone team -- this thing is super cool.

Blog list: Blog list

Sat, 23 Sep 2006 22:35:12 GMT

Trina's Blog
Omar, The Oracle
CradWorld Blog
"and I'm never... going back... to my old Blog"
Reeve's Blog
Large thoughts from a Little mind
Dan Crevier's Blog
Geek Central
Mike's Blog
Mike's thoughts on life. Also, a good place to find a used car.
Rob's Blog
...the story of a boy and his paycheck. A new happy ending everyday.