reading frenzy April 23, 2008
Posted by Al Castle in : Castle, Izzy, Friends, Reads , 2commentsIn the last few months I’ve been on a reading kick, reaching out into literature I wouldn’t normally devour. NY Times best sellers and those kinds of books that make you relate to the feeeeelinnngs, wants and desires of characters. Characters that at no point in the story are doing anything with political intrigue, nano tehcnology, super-viruses, secret societies, or variations of the space-time continuum. Lets just come out and say it. I’m reading chick books.
I’ve dabbled before in this area, always something lent to me, nothing I’d pick off a shelf and purchase willingly. Except now, with some suggestions from my friends, that’s exactly what I’m doing.
In fact, I’ve recently finished The Life of Pi. Boy was that a rough start. Slow, uninteresting dialog and only a few religious observations that made me chuckle. The middle of the book got more interesting. It was survival against a superior killing machine, granted not a Kzin, but a tiger nonetheless. This I can relate to. Since as most of you know I often battle Izzy in a fight to the play death. The last third of the novel was exciting, I had trouble putting it down, and with an ending that left me wondering.
In case you’ve stayed up late at night, staring into the blackness, fantasizing about what my book reports were like as a child. Well now you’ve seen one.
This month I think I’ve spent almost $200 on books. A few computer programming, a couple older Frank Herbert sci-fi genre I’ve been looking out for, and a few of these “others”.
Now I have this huge stack of books on my desk and frankly it’s a bit overwhelming. All of them call to be thumbed through and started. I think I should put them away on the bookshelf except for the one I’m actually going to read now. Yes. Yes, that would make things easier.
For my fellow book worms, regardless of genre preference, may I suggest setting up a free account on Shelfari. It’s really a great site from some local Seattlites. Perhaps my favorite feature is the ability to export your library in full to a spreadsheet. Unlike most sites, whether they are social media or not, the information you provide for your accounts/profiles isn’t generally exportable to take with you. In this case, you own your own information and I think that’s worth supporting.
redneck laptop hacks April 21, 2008
Posted by Al Castle in : Puter Stuff, Squirrels, Picture of the Day, Friends , add a commentI was talking to a friend of mine last night and he was telling me how the backlight for his laptop went dead. This is the light inside of the laptop screen (monitor) that illuminates it and lets you actually use / see the items on the screen.
He’s a technician and not afraid to take anything apart. He’s also evidently quite crafty as you can see from this picture he sent me.
Click on the image for a larger view.
He’s removed the cover from the laptop, and then placed an industrial shop light behind the screen, with a flap of tinfoil over to act as shield and prevent the user from having their retinas burnt out. I’ve detailed some of the finer points of the picture so be sure to check it out.
Pabst Beer April 19, 2008
Posted by Al Castle in : Squirrels, Picture of the Day, Friends , add a comment
linux community gathers for annual spring fun April 17, 2008
Posted by Al Castle in : Puter Stuff, Marketing, Castle, Travel, Friends , 4commentsEvery April, a growing number of people from all walks of life gather in Bellingham, WA to share in the experience that is LinuxFest Northwest.
Attendees, sponsors, lecturers and exhibitors come from all over the Greater Northwest, including neighboring states and Vancouver, BC. For many enthusiasts of computers, software and technology, this is an event unlike any others.
Every year since it’s inception LinuxFest Northwest has been the diligent and hard work of a core group of the Bellingham Linux Users Group (BLUG) who shake the branches of our community and organize the nuts that fall out. Together with the Bellingham Technical College a strong supporter, providing the facility, and access to it’s many resources along with other neighboring and contributing computer users groups, the annual event comes together.
This is what makes LinuxFest unique. Everyone involved is a volunteer and everything is accomplished by pulling together. It’s not as glossy and shiny as MacWorld, nor expensive. The event is put on at no charge to the public. (And there’s better swag than at MacWorld.)
Anyone from any walk of life, any age, is more than welcome. You can learn about Linux and open source software, speak to industry leaders, authors, local businesses, and the guy across town who built something really cool in his garage. It’s all about sharing what you know and having a whole lot of fun.
Having attended and presented at previous fests, I’ve had a chance to meet and speak with some highly intelligent and creative people. Some of them famous in the technical arena, some not. My first time attending I was expecting boring lectures and presentations about how buying some corporate software would make me a happier person in life. Or a few dozen 30-somethings having crawled out of their basement wandering about.
Instead I met and talked to all kinds of interesting people. I remember sitting on a couch talking to a plain clothed police officer from the city of Blaine. We randomly started up a conversation about recovering files from a “perps” computer. Having some experience using several tools to recover files, but by no means an expert, I believe I pointed him in the right direction. The number of women and children attending was also surprising. This wasn’t an event just for the geeks.
It’s a free social event with a simple goal of sharing what we know about a piece of free software called Linux and the concept of open source. You may not be aware of it, but these things have and continue to reshape everything in your life. From your Tivo, to the the technology companies in your mutual fund. You may not be a “geek” or even know how to send an email let alone understand what “open source” means, and that’s okay. Come anyways, get involved in your community. A little knowledge can go along way and be fun.
- LinuxFest Northwest 2008 is a two day free event. April 26th - April 27th.
- Directions to the Bellingham Technical College.
- List of LinuxFest exhibitors.
- List of LinuxFest presentors.
- Official Website with more information including lodging.
Unthreaded Editable Tagline April 15, 2008
Posted by Al Castle in : Puter Stuff, Squirrels, TimeWaster, Marketing, Castle, Web Design & Dev, Friends , 4commentsFor a long time I had a bit of code in my blog header, just beneath the blog title (Unthreaded), that randomly choose and displayed a quote, quip or blurb that I had written. Things like “Castlemonkey Speaks of Lemon Scented Victory” or “Castlemonkey Speaks of hotdogs with no cream cheese” and so on.
Sure to become a bore quickly, I’ve added in some code to make the tagline for this blog editable. By anyone. [Currently I’m not requiring you to identify yourself or login to do so. This may change later.]
Simply click on the text, whatever it may be, as anyone is free to change it, and you should see something like the picture above.
Type in whatever you like and click SAVE. The changes are global and saved to the database, meaning everyone who views the site right after you made that change, will see the new tagline. Until it’s changed again.
Dangerous huh?
Attribution Update: This idea was swiped from my amigo David. You can also see his version at Cranberry.
happy birthday to the midget April 3, 2008
Posted by Al Castle in : Squirrels, Picture of the Day, Friends , 3comments
i’m a little surprised and disturbed that someone else thought of the whole raccoon laying eggs thing. of course my twist is better. raccoons lay eggs in your brain, not your car. duh. although since you’re leaving town, i guess the raccoons will be forced to lay the eggs in the glove box, under the seats and of course in the darkest reaches of the trunk.
ultra mega supremo birthday wishes.
Tags: raccoons, eggs, happy birthday, ultra mega supremo, midget
my flock March 28, 2008
Posted by Al Castle in : Puter Stuff, OSX, Web Design & Dev, Friends , add a commentlast week sometime i finally decided to give flock another shot. It’s based off of mozilla - runs on windows, macs and linux. it seems primarily focused with the social networking aspect of the internet and provides many built in tools to keep me up to date on the happenings of my friends and visa versa.
for starters it has a built in wysiwyg blog editor which i’m using now to compose this. i can save a draft, work offline and then upload it to one or more of my saved blog profiles [blogger, typepad, wordpress, et al]. since i tend to travel a lot having the ability to work offline is pretty handy.
it has a built in feed reader which also lets me define the layout (number of columns), allows me to mark posts or comments as viewed, blog about, save, or email a post with a click and so on.
i can easily upload pictures by drag and dropping them into the media sidebar, which ties into facebook, photobucket, youtube, picasa and flickr. since it knows who i am it can pull pictures to view from one of my accounts or about my friends too.
send and receive email with its tie in’s to gmail and yahoo mail without having to switch to my native email app.
perhaps one of the handiest things is just staying on top of what my friends are doing. it ties into twitter and facebook, you can see status, profile changes and even poke someone right from the sidebar.
i still use firefox as my primary browser for web development since it has my most useful extensions installed. but for my socializing and online recreation, flock has my attention.
Blogged with the Flock Browser
Tags: browser wars, social networking, multi-tasking
coach lyle March 24, 2008
Posted by Al Castle in : Castle, Fitness, Friends , 2commentsearly this morning i talked to my friend lyle about the grand idea of going to the gym. by this evening i was tired and had a headache. coach lyle would have none of that.
“quit being such a whiny little bitch or i’ll kick you in the baby maker!”
ok. well that’s what i heard, what she really said was something like,
“suck it up castle”.
in any case, i went. i swam laps. pushed myself too hard. almost drowned - twice. a guy about 70 was out lapping me 2 to 1. i can seriously barely move. i feel like such a slug.
i guess i shouldn’t have smoked on the way to the gym.
One Degree of Kevin Bacon February 22, 2008
Posted by Al Castle in : OSX, Picture of the Day, Castle, Friends, iPhone , 1 comment so far
Ok, I never starred in a movie with Kevin Bacon, but I did end up meeting him yesterday afternoon, as I stood in the first class line for the security checkpoint at SEATAC. He and Golden Globe nominee, Kyra Sedgwick, star of The Closer were talking to an older couple just ahead of me.
They both were facing me but I didn’t even notice Kevin at first. I kept looking at Kyra thinking she looked a lot like someone from TV.
Anyways, nothing exciting, I finally realized who they were and it was obvious they weren’t looking to be recognized, especially while trapped in an airport. So I never asked for an autograph or to have my picture taken with them. The old couple was occupying most of their time and were quite pleased to be in their company. When a lull in the conversation hit, I just very nonchalantly leaned over and asked Kevin if he wanted my autograph. He politely said he was good. Then I continued to play with my iPhone like he was an ungrateful booger.
I did snag some iPhone pictures, which didn’t turn out so great since I was trying to be sneaky.
Of course the security people, while looking at Kevin and Kyras boarding passes asked for an autograph. When it was my turn, I handed the guard my ticket and identification. I asked him if he wanted my autograph. He looks at me dumbfounded and says, “Who are you?” His portly Polynesian helper looks at my license, turns to him and says, “Why he’s Al Castle.” He got a dirty look from me and she got my charming smile I save for special occasions. Ungrateful booger central.
Things I noticed. They seem happy together, Kevin is a little shorter than me, Kyra is tiny, has beautiful hair and the messiest purse. Kevin owns a Macbook Pro and Treo.
I had to stop myself from singing and doing the Footloose dance. ( Kick off your Sunday shoes, Oowhee, Marie, Shake it, shake it for me…)
After going through security I walked ahead of them and headed to the far away Terminal A. Stopping in a little store to get the latest Macworld magazine and a couple candy bars. I turn around to realize they followed me. Kyra sets her purse down next to me and that’s when I notice it’s the type of purse you can probably find just about anything in, though not easily.
Again I leave them to their privacy and continue on. I glance back, they seem to be following me again. I’m thinking celebrity stalking now has a new meaning. As I try to ditch them and slip into a restaurant across from my gate to grab a drink I notice that their gate just happened to be next to mine.
So to all my good friends and family reading, you’re all only two degrees of separation. 
[In this second picture I think Kevin is wondering if I’m taking a picture. Or maybe he’s admiring my iPhone. Or my cashmere jacket. Possibly my shoes. I was dressed pretty snazzy.]
Project LOL Izzy February 19, 2008
Posted by Al Castle in : Squirrels, Picture of the Day, Izzy, Friends , 7commentsI love this Eye-Fi SD card. While I took pictures it automatically uploaded them to my compooter via wifi. So sweet.
Anyways so my friend Pithy (aka The Bitter Bean) sent me this hilarious picture of a Purrito which has been sitting in the back of my brain for a few days.
As I come in from a smoke break, I drop my hoodie on the floor, directly onto my beloved Izzy. Well, it was bound to happen. I ended up unceremoniously stuffing her into the sleeve. The first few seconds before her confusion wore off it was perfect, but I couldn’t hold the camera still from crying and laughing so hard. By the time I was able to regain enough composure, she’d already managed to squirm onto her feet.
Aside from looking pissed, the results are far from being purrito-rific.
Maybe if I fashioned a tiny belt I could get her to look more like a Jawa from Star Wars.
I wanted to try again, but she ran off somewhere.
…a little while later, I came up with this…..
