Buzzwords

The following words become a bigger part of my life everyday:

• security
• privacy (or no reasonable expectation of)
• DMCA
• file-sharing
• p2p
• copyright
• alleged
• infringement
• piracy
• subpoena
• liability
• indemnify
• rights (or lack thereof)
• wireless
• mobile
• virus
• exploit
• vulnerability
• compromise
• spyware

I’m not sure this is a good thing.

Spring

Hey, it’s official spring now (despite the weeks of rain around here) so I thought I’d change up the site.

New PowerBook

Holy crap. I bought a Mac today. (I really had to. The Stanford deal was just too ridiculous to turn down.)

The Great Glass Elevator

I’ve been reverting to childhood entertainment lately– buying DVDs of the Justice League series, reading all the Chronicles of Narnia books again, etc. Among those things, I picked up a copy of Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator. I’m very excited about the new Charlie and the Chocolate Factory movie, but I always like this book more. I haven’t read this book in over ten years and I’m sure I didn’t appreciate it then when I did, but Roald Dahl’s description of the government and characterization of the President and his staff are too funny and scarily a propos.

For example, when they discover Willy Wonka and his crew attempting to link up with Space Hotel “USA,” the Chief of the Army exclaims, “Let’s blow them up first, crash bang wallop bang-bang-bang-bang… Come on, Mr. P… Let’s have some really super-duper explosions!” And as they try to figure out who is in the great glass elevator, the Chief Spy plays a game of twenty questions and he leads the President into coming up with his own crazy conspiracy theory as to who these people are and what they are trying to do. More insanity ensues and let’s not forget Miss Tibbs, the Vice President, who also happened to be the President’s nanny. She’s constantly seen having to guide him along and actually sings a song where she laments the fact that she helped the idiot become president.

The book was originally published around 1972, but it’s strangely and frighteningly appropriate for 2005.

Superfriends/Office Space mashup

If you loved Office Space and you love the Superfriends, you’ve got to check out this animated short at iFilm:

(Discovered off of Boing Boing)

Adventures in Blood Donation

The last three days have been a blur. On Wednesday, I went to donate blood like I’ve been doing for years. But for the first time, as I was drinking juice in the “post-donation cantene room” (I swear that’s what they call it) and suddenly, I didn’t feel so good and have been practically bed-ridden for the past three days.

Now, every asshole I’ve told that I got sick after donating blood has been saying, “Well, what did you expect?!” They throw up their arms and look at me like I’m crazy to have expected to give blood and not feel like shit for the past three days. Those who don’t donate blood regularly, they try to attribute a direct causal relationship. Well, I’ve been giving blood regularly for the past five or six years and this is the first time anything remotely bad has happened. And before I donated, the medical assistant noted that my temperature was a little high (but still within the acceptable range for donating) and my pulse was a little high. These are traditionally signs of some infection or dehydration, but since I felt fine, we went ahead with the donation. Unfortunately, for the past three days, my pulse has been racing, my blood pressure has been high, my head has been throbbing, and I’ve barely been able to keep anything down (I am a new fan of Pedialyte freezer pops). So, obviously, I was already sick when I walked into the blood center and donating exacerbated any preexisting condition, but it certainly didn’t cause the last three days of hell I’ve been going through.

In the end, I ended up getting more blood drawn to get some bloodwork done (I’ve got the needle marks in both arms to prove it) and although not conclusive, it looks like I was legitimately sick in some way. (And appropriately, they pulled the blood I donated in the end.) I’ve been on medication for the past three days and was basically sleeping on and off all day yesterday because of the medication and attempt to sleep off the sheer pain and nausea. I’m finally feeling better now, although I’m taking it slowly. I’m behind in so many ways and I feel like I’ve lost the past three days in a blurry, drug-filled haze. To be sure though, this doesn’t discourage me from donating blood in the future– and I hope it doesn’t discourage anyone else– because I know how important donating blood can be, especially for a universal donor like myself. I’ll just make sure that if I’ve got even the smallest sign of not being 100%, I’ll wait to donate another day.