Journal

happy birthday Mishti!

Mishti is two years old! An official toddler? She's been toddling for a long time though, and will continue to toddler.

We love the meesh(es).

(Stuff's been happening. Will try to catch up this weekend.)

Firefox 3

Just upgraded last night and didn't like the default theme. So it's taken me forever to explore Themes. I've been missing out.

Right now I'm liking Red Cats (green flavor) and GrApple Yummy (blue).

I hope the memory leak is fixed.

Thunderbirdy

Running Eudora through Parallels the past year and a half has been annoying, to say the least. Much of it was that it was just so slow – I want to say it's because my mailboxes were stored on the Mac partition and not within Parallels, but I'm not really sure.

Eudora for Mac was not an option, unfortunately, because I had to convert the mailboxes, and I would lose some message markers (and statuses, I think). Converting the mailboxes was not successful, anyway.

So it's been a slow move to abandon a program that's been good to me the past decade (!), and with so much history saved, who would? But it had to happen. And I did it last night with the most logical choice: Mozilla Thunderbird.

It's taken a couple of hours all together since last night, but I'm back up with email in a native setting. I can finally keep Parallels shut when I don't need CQDE.

Thanks to the following software for making this transition possible:

PS – Happy Futon Day!

one good thing, one bad thing

The good: with some minor adjustments to our driving style, Asma and I have squeezed 80–120 extra miles out of a full tank of gas. In the city.

The tricks?

  • Don't let your RPM go above 2000.
  • Neutrality is good. Shift to neutral where it makes sense (downhill, whenever you think you need to slow or stop).

There are other ways to save on gas consumption, but these two tips don't require anything more than altering some habits in the driver's seat. And at least for a Honda Accord that typically gets 25 MPG on the highway, the change is significant: 24.37 MPG in the city.

The bad: we went to a memorial service for a family friend's great aunt, and the food was not vegan-friendly. But we could not starve ourselves.

awakening

I think I'm starting to understand some fundamentals of life.

Facebook releases platform source code

So I was really floored and excited when I saw that Facebook released their platform source code. As soon as I found out, I downloaded it and started going through all the code.

And I'm underwhelmed.

For a long time now I've been trying to envision how they did things, and when working on our own platform [‘ our own’ being VarLabs], I've been thinking, ‘Am I approaching this the right way? How is Facebook tackling this?’. And the answer is that I'm doing it far more elegantly and orderly, I think, than Facebook.

There are some interesting things for sure, but on the whole I'm a bit disappointed. So either I'm a delusional jackass for missing something amazing, or I'm as good as I think I am and just not having a chance to show off my skills.

Based on the code, I think Facebook's strength lies in how they mix together applications written in different languages, their MySQL scaling, and their consistent and pretty UI. Their coding and any clever queries, not so much. At least from what they've openly released.

Whatever the case, it's working well for them, so I'm just being a stickler for details. What they've done has inspired and guided how I'm approaching new projects. So good for them.

bye-bye, dairy & eggs?

On the whole, I think I will be following a vegan diet for the rest of my life. It won't be easy, but I can't buy into the cruelty anymore. So this is a start.

I will try to find farms and farmers that are sane, and if I agree with their practices, I'll buy dairy and eggs. But there are certain outcomes that may not go away ever.

Still on the fence about honey.

I would not call myself a vegan; the label is like that of feminism. The overall ideals might be noble and positive, but in the end, they're labels. And those labels make for extremist thought. I want to call myself cruelty-free and fair, hopefully in every aspect of my life.

This isn't just about animals, after all.

At the same time, I can't understand people's sensitivity towards following a vegetarian/vegan diet. People are honestly offended when someone doesn't want to eat meat? Really? These people are either ignorant of how those animals were treated from birth to death, or they're just sick. (Or both.)

(And just to be clear, this isn't against meat-eaters in general.)

What happened to rationality and compassion? It's been missing for thousands of years, sure, but it can't be that hard to have.

Anyway, let's see how this all plays out. And move on to happier things.

Asma, Mona, and I went to Poplar Spring yesterday. I fell in love with a new birdie:

Arabelle!

That's Arabelle. She's a guineahen. Someone let her go, or she escaped, and she was found on the streets of DC. Meh.

She's currently under partial isolation, but one of the co-owners, Terry, asked if Mona and I could take Arabelle outside and watch over her while she explores. I was happy she asked, given that it was only my first time at the farm and I was too caught up in taking pictures to do much real work.

Good times were had. I'm going to go every weekend for sure.

And horses take huge dumps.

back, or have been back

To sum up the Bay: wow. California is a strange place. Oklahoma, Florida, Illinois, and DC are similar in a lot of ways, but Cali is just different. I might have an uneasy peace with that vibe, but it'll work for sure.

The investor meetings went well, but I'm not sure we're any closer to funding yet. The more I develop, the more nervous I get. E-commerce is not a thing to just throw together. Eek.

Josh is in China for two weeks, so I am sort of heading the CMS group until he returns. Hopefully it'll be uneventful and I won't be stuck doing tons and tons of work. Sigh.

Asma has started volunteering 4–5 times a week at Poplar Spring Animal Sanctuary and will continue to do so until we move. I'd rather do that with my time. She's lucky. I'm going to volunteer their on Saturday though! I'll try to make it a weekly Saturday and/or Sunday thing, time permitting. Can't wait to meet the animals.

I love animals. But not Sheese.

o hoei, from san francisco

Asma and I arrived in SF Saturday morning. We missed our first flight but managed to get on the next one on standby.

This area rocks. We've had a lot of good food and done a lot of walking. We've also taken tons of pictures. The scenery and weather is amazing. The weather can be confusing, though.

Our first order of business after checking in to the hotel was to meet someone to see an apartment. We walked through a very sketchy area and thought we were going the wrong way, so we turned around only to realize we were going the right way. So we scrapped the apartment but managed to find Taqueria El Castillito. Amazing food. So that turned out to be a succesful outing.

Right now I'm on the Caltrain, on my way to Redwood City to meet Raymond. We're going to prep in our temporary office for a meeting with an angel investor. It's the second one for this guy. First time I'm ever participating in something like this. I'm nervous.

I also stood in front of Facebook's main office (wow!). Stanford is amazing. Berkeley has its pros and cons.

Commuting around here might actually be fun. All seats on Caltrain and BART have enough space to work on your laptop. And the scenery [again] is nice. Metro's has mayb 25% of their seats as being laptop friendly, and half those are handicap-preferred.

In conclusion, we feel good about the move for sure.

4th anniversary

...of having an account on Facebook. Back when it was The Facebook.

Facebook Facebook Facebook. Say it fast!

in a span of 3 days

We left for Springfield on Friday morning. Saturday we watched Hasan graduate, and we ate a good amount. Sunday we came home on the most turbulent flight either of us have been on.

We snapped a lot of good pictures: I looked or acted goofy in most of them, and my stomach jutted out.

The pilot on Sunday had a perfect landing despite the plane still moving around from the wind. Pilots are awesome.

Mishti got even fatter, presumably from lack of running around.

fever predictor

If I keep not sleeping at a decent time and waking up early, I'll have a third encounter with a fever in…three to ten days? Just in time for either Springfield or San Francisco. Fun.

Even with all the work and late nights while doing TCC, I never got fevers. Just burn-out. Waking up early is really tough. Thankfully, Asma did shift her wake-up time from 5 to 6 a few weeks ago.

Thankfully, Asma is also quitting Census. Tomorrow is her last day. Too bad it didn't work out overall, because her co-workers are good people.

Not enough time for things. Sigh. So tired.

the week-end

american weddings

We went to Asma's former manager's wedding on Saturday, and gave her co-worker Matt and his girlfriend Heather a ride there. (Matt and Heather are pretty fun, btw.)

Overall, it was good. I caved and ate a pulled barbecue beef sandwich – wasn't worth it. The sauce and the texture was nice, but the meat itself didn't do much for me. So reset my vegetarianism to May 4th. I'm really aiming to just give up meat now, but if I'm just able to cut my consumption to hardly any, that's better than not cutting it down at all.

And what's with the electric slide and other retarded dances? These line dances… are they just for white folks? I don't get it.

walking

We walked around with Mona yesterday in-between Adams Morgan and Cleveland Park. Beautiful weather.

First, we were in the cheering section of the Avon breast cancer walk, waiting to intercept Sarah. She covered 40 miles in two days. Amazing.

Second, we went to 2 Amy's for their weekly donuts. Yum. We also went there for the first time Friday night. Possibly best pizza I've ever had. They're great.

Third, we were going to go to the zoo, but felt pretty exhausted after Chipotle. We'll go soon. I haven't been there ever (that I can remember); definitely not since I moved here.

camera

We're getting a Canon XTi! It's arriving today! I'm working from home today and keeping my ear open for the UPS guy person. We're ultra-excited about this. Haven't had good pictures in years. We missed out on Mishti's baby months, sigh. It's a really big purchase for us, especially with the move, but we've been waiting too long. We probably should've skipped out on a couple of things, including the Wii.

Hopefully we'll be okay with the move.

Nine Inch Nails

It's lame of me to say this, not knowing him personally, but I'm so proud of Trent. All this output from him, licensing his music for free distribution, being communicative with fans, working with Saul, and just general awesomeness has got me admiring him. I thought he was an amazing musician before, but now I'm really inspired by everything he's doing. Fighting off depression and addiction and being free of record labels has really helped him step out into the world.

His music isn't nearly as intricate as The Fragile. In fact, I used to think With Teeth was pretty bad because of that, and wasn't really sure if he'd ever be able to get his skills back. But the relative simplicity of all the songs nowadays (apparently because Rick Rubin told him he had to keep it simple) is definitely part of the reason he's ridiculously prolific now.

And it's not just prolific, but his songs are pretty good in general (his touch with production hasn't diminished: it'll still be better than 99% of anything that will ever come out probably). He still goes back to that style of his musically/lyrically, but he's also experimenting. And the songs aren't so depressing anymore. They're getting to be more thoughtful in a non-selfish way.

I'm even appreciating With Teeth more now. I knew the album had a lot to do with recovery, but the lyrics were pretty awful at many points (production-wise, it's pretty good). A few weeks ago, Asma and I spent a night watching nin videos on YouTube and watched ‘Only’, among other things: the song used to make us cringe. A little bit later we watched ‘Down In It’ and the lines

just then, a tiny little dot caught my eye, it was just about too small to see, but I watched it way too long, it was pulling me down

jumped out at us like it was the first time we'd ever heard them, because they were so similar to some lines from ‘Only’:

well the tiniest little dot caught my eye and it turned out to be a scab, and i had this funny feeling, like I just knew it's something bad

It all clicked at that point. ‘Only’ was a joke – he was poking fun at his old self. Knowing that, the sort of lameness that we thought it was went away and we started liking it on the whole. It wasn't a direct response to ‘Down In It’, but the video was like the antithesis of all other videos he's done: clean, sterile, fairly calm, and not in some weird place. The only chaotic thing was himself, except it was confined to this:

NIN - Only

ANYWAY, what I'm getting at is that Trent gets us excited. He released an album entirely for free online, during the night. And we should be getting the ultra-mega-fantastic edition of Ghosts today. And maybe he'll release another album, probably while he's taking a dump during his tour.

So far, that's four albums released in three years. Two just within a span of a few weeks. Yay.

Radiohead can eat the farm animal feces that Asma will be scooping up in two weeks.

new nin album!!

The Slip.

It's completely free, no option to buy.

And released through a torrent.

(They got smarter this time.)

I love Trent.

Back to sleep.

clever made-in-America trick

Do I:

1. Buy unethically made clothes of good quality?

; or:

2. Buy ethically made clothes of crap quality at higher prices?

American Apparel is shit. Nice way to capitalize on ‘ethics’.

Are we too far gone to bring quality, affordable prices, and sustainable/fair products to the masses?

before i forget

1. The Wild Parrots of Telegraph Hill is such a good documentary/movie. I nearly cried. All animal lovers should see it. Or maybe everyone. Some people won't get it.

2. I [or we?] got a Wii today! Finally. Months of waiting and passing up chances are gone. If you've got early Sunday morning free and happen to see it advertised in your weekly Sunday Target ad thinger, there's a good chance you'll get one. We are hooked.

3. I make a good huevos rancheros.

infrequent update on life: big news from the party boat

Guess what?

We're moving to San Francisco.

Actually, this move has been anticipated for months (possibly even years, if I count the potentials that The CulturalConnect might've lived up to). Asma, up until recently, was fighting the idea, so I never pushed it or anything. The plan initially was that, once our [Raymond and I] startup takes off and we get funding, only then would we move. But all that uncertainty meant we couldn't plan long-term or even short-term.

Then just a few days ago, Asma was like "Let's move to San Francisco". And ever since then there's been a flurry of excitement in the house. We're now super excited about the future and possibilities. All the ideas we have on what we want to do seem like they can happen there.

At the very least, it'll be great weather and food, and new experiences. DC is nice, and on pretty days the city really is pleasant to walk around, and there are scenic things in the area. But outside of that, we've never really found any sort activities to take part in. At least I haven't. My head's been in the work sand.

So that's that for the moment. We're expecting to be out of here by end of July. That gives us a lot of time to clear the junk we've accumulated and maybe fix up all the damage around here. The next apartment we get will be baby-proof.

The startup seems to be going well, more so on the funding side. I've been bogged down with AARP work that it's usually hard for me to do other things during the week. But I'm excited, and things are starting to come together a bit. I might be able to start building and testing basic functionality by next weekend.

I wonder if I can say now what exactly we're doing? Maybe not.

Be nice to the chickens

Also, I'm basically a vegetarian now, and have not eaten meat in the last three weeks (minus tuna salad one day).

The trigger was when we were at Soul Vegetarian before we went to see Saul Williams perform on April 7th. Asma was looking through a PETA pamphlet in the restaurant and read to me how male chicklets were discarded (i.e. crushed/killed) and that their beaks were cut off.

Not that I wasn't aware of the horrible conditions that mass-produced farm animals have to endure, but to hear about what happens to these innocent little babies is just obscene. That was the line totally crossed.

This doesn't mean that I'm going to stop eating meat completely. What it does mean is that I won't eat meat unless I know the source. So if it takes five years to find farmers that aren't cruel, that's how long I'm going to abstain from meat. I also need to be more wary of dairy and eggs (but I think we're doing pretty good on that end).

This meat ‘industry’ (as if animals are a commodity like steel and nothing more) is disgusting. I don't get why people are allowed to do this.

But that's enough of that. Be aware of what you eat, don't lie to yourself. If you're ok with it, so be it. That's all.

Good evening and great luck.

FF VI soundtrack reminder

Last play: 5/3/2007

an exception to the rule

I would never seriously consider getting a government job. Ever. I've been in a state bureaucracy, and I'm hearing certain things that only confirm what I've thought of a federal job. It's not like it's a surprise at all.

However, Asma happened to find what would be the only federal job I'd ever consider applying to. In fact, that's the most excited I've ever been about a job description.

Did anyone think the government had positions like Apprentice and Journeyman? That's amazing. How many places have apprenticeships that take years, anyway?

So whether or not I make it big as a tech entrepreneur, I will seriously consider going to the government for something like this. But if I could somehow become a typeface designer's apparentice and get to work with old technology (i.e. engraving, print press, etc.)… that would be happy times.

at 4:55 AM every weekday, iCal is set to play…

"34 Ghosts IV"