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Looking For Quacks In The Pavement

Author: Karel Kerezman

  • You want bad? This is bad.

    Stumbling around the Internet this afternoon, I came across the Internet Archive. While they don’t seem to have any copies of my very first Europa-hosted pages (let us all get down on our bony little knees right now and thank whatever gods granted us THAT particular blessing), they do have a copy of an early KGON site design that I was, sad to say, completely responsible for.

    I was really proud of that thing at the time. Be thankful that the Archive doesn’t have any of my earlier attempts. Be very thankful.

    Update: Correction. While they only have my most-recent style of the old Europa location (the Rael ’99 design) if you search for http://www.europa.com/~rael, when you add /index.html to the search you find this little gem. It’s not the oldest version of my site, oddly enough, but it’s old enough to be designed for IE 3.01 . *shudder* Yeah, I was a shill for Microsoft back in those days. Live and learn, I guess.

  • The web survey to end all web surveys

    Well, it was bound to happen. It’s the “Web Test Taker Analysis.”

    Web Test Taker Analysis
    Karel is a menace with a bit too much free time

    You use web tests to annoy people on regular basis. Medication might help.
    Take the test yourself, or not.

    Note that posting the results on a web page may invalidate the results, and require retesting.

    Bonus Detailed Personality Analysis:

    Some of your aspirations tend to be pretty unrealistic. At times you are extroverted, affable, sociable, while at other times you are introverted, wary and reserved. You have found it unwise to be too frank in revealing yourself to others. You pride yourself on being an independent thinker and do not accept others’ opinions without satisfactory proof. You prefer a certain amount of change and variety, and become dissatisfied when hemmed in by restrictions and limitations. At times you have serious doubts as to whether you have made the right decision or done the right thing. Disciplined and controlled on the outside, you tend to be worrisome and insecure on the inside.

    Your sexual adjustment has presented some problems for you. While you have some personality weaknesses, you are generally able to compensate for them. You have a great deal of unused capacity which you have not turned to your advantage. You have a tendency to be critical of yourself. You have a strong need for other people to like you and for them to admire you.

  • Winter Book

    This morning marked the release of the Winter 2002 Arbitron “book.” I haven’t heard too much from any of the stations besides KNRK, whose programming staff were heard to be whooping it up after seeing some of their numbers. Apparently Jayn, Marconi and Ty are tops in their dayparts or something. How scary is it that Marconi has a top-ranked afternoon radio show?

    (You’re a great guy, Marconi, but the fact that thousands of people listen to what you and Tiny do in that studio every day frightens me deeply.)

    Viewing the new data, of course, required a new version of software from Arbitron. Guess who got to run from office to office all afternoon? Yep, it was me. Who else would it have been?

    Tomorrow I get to attend a department head meeting, work on purchasing some storage hardware and rebuild the KFXX (The Fan) studio PC. I can’t wait for Humpday, can you?

    Have you noticed that I ended a lot of statements in this entry with question marks?

  • Weekend Update

    The Kerezman Clan had quite the weekend this time around. Erica went to the chess tournament held at the Oregon Convention Center from Friday through Sunday. She ended up with a 2.5 ranking (two wins and a half-point “buy”) of which we are all very, very proud. When you figure that this is her first year of playing chess in a competitive environment, she’s done very well for a 2nd-grader. Way to go, Erica!

    On Saturday we went to celebrate my grandfather’s 75th birthday. Other than Aunt Jean, we were the sole representatives of “our side” of the family. Granddad’s son Eric was there with some of his family and other relatives. We got to pig out on Mary’s wonderful cooking, embarassing stories were exchanged, and a generally nice time was had by all. We were there for over five hours; in our family that qualifies as a family togetherness marathon.

    Sunday was spent with the girls going to the last two rounds of chess competition and the boys going to the office. Alexander and I went around to all of the sales cubes to run the software inventory data collection program John Graefe at Corporate put together. Everything went smoothly, and we celebrated by hanging out in the training room and eating mac-and-cheese. When the girls were done they came to pick us up, and then we rented some videos and collapsed in the living room for the rest of the day.

    It was a splendid, busy weekend.

  • Anti-aliased fonts!

    This probably ranks quite low on the scale of “Things Geeks Should Do With Their Linux Boxen,” but I’ve been wanting to see working anti-aliased Truetype fonts under Linux for years. Thanks to the instructions on this page I was able to do just that. Actually, I had to read the gdkxft documentation thoroughly and repeatedly as there were some quirks on my newly-rebuilt Zero that made it a bit more difficult to implement.

    As of now, Zero has a nearly complete set of software and interfaces. My next move is to set up some more of the guts-level stuff, mostly so that when the machine is restarted everything comes back up that’s supposed to. (Email, webserver, etc.)

  • The Fortnight Friday Five

    Or, as Jessy might typo, the Firday Five. *chortle*

    • What are your hobbies? – You mean, other than all the time I spend geeking around on computers? Oh yeah, I have a decent-sized music collection, I’m into anime (especially on DVD), various Sci-Fi TV shows, various and sundry Fantasy/SF writers, and occasionally I get all creative and make a video or a wallpaper or write something.
    • Do you collect anything? If so, what? – CDs by certain recording artists (Genesis, including solo acts; Midnight Oil; Jethro Tull; Pet Shop Boys; used to collect Depeche Mode, etc). Some comic book titles, mostly imported manga like No Need For Tenchi and Sailor Moon. Go ahead, laugh.
    • Is there a hobby you’re interested in, but just don’t have the time/money to do? – Model vehicles. I love radio controlled boats, cars, planes and just about any other vehicle they can think of building in working miniature. That stuff’s expensive, though. It also helps to have good mechanical skills, which I tend to lack.
    • Have you ever turned a hobby into a moneymaking opportunity? – I’ve never turned anything into a moneymaking opportunity.
    • Besides web-related stuff (burbs, rings, etc.), what clubs do you belong to? – None at the moment, though I keep threatening to join NOVA (Northern Oregon/Vancouver Anime) even though the meetings are almost always on days when I can’t attend.

    Friday Five

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