I have no interest in ordinary humans!

You may have noticed, but photosinensis.net is currently down. I've got a lot of problems with it, at least in part due to moving it from Missouri City to Carrollton. I'm also taking this opportunity to update the operating system, which is now two versions out of date.

I had another post, but this isn't the thread for that discussion, nor do I have enough time to write it (I need sleep desperately). Just know that I'm alive and that a prediction I made two years ago is inching closer to coming true--and this scares me greatly, as I don't want that prediction to be true.

This was posted originally at my WordPress blog, here.

Every Sunday afternoon, I make up a grocery list and head down to Kroger’s. Obviously, I need to eat.

When I get to the check-out line, there’s always a section for a pocket Complete Idiot’s Guide next to People, Us Magazine, and the National Enquirer. With only one exception, this is a guide to something that frankly, a complete idiot should probably not know.

I first noticed this when the book was The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Faith. This seems akin to handing a functionally retarded person an AK-47, a chain of ammo, and telling them that it’s a toy. Faith is a radical and dangerous thing, and I’m the titular complete idiot would probably use it in a way that is destructive and irresponsible without comprehending why it is.

Last week was rather innocuous: The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Puppies. Sure, a complete idiot should probably not obtain a puppy (for the puppy’s sake, really), but buying it in the hopes of helping a young child understand the responsibilities of new pet ownership is reasonable.

This week, though, it was back to the scary: The Complete Idiot’s Guide to The Book of Revelation. I’m assuming, given the cover and everything, that they’re talking about the Apocalypse of John of Patmos, and not one of many other volumes so titled. I have no file system checking clue how the hell they expect to explain that bit of mind screw in a tract shorter than the book itself. Hell, entire volumes have been written on the book in the 1900 years since it was written, and still few can make much sense of what the metaphor is supposed to mean. If you don’t believe me, I’d suggest you see how popular premillenial dispensationalism is in your neighborhood. Seriously, those metaphors could be applied to almost anything. Yet here’s a little pamphlet that says that it can explain the whole text. I find that preposterous.

What worries me is that I know someone is buying this crap. What worries me is that most of the churches in the area (Carrollton/Irving/Coppell/Farmer’s Branch/North Dallas) are the kind that would make this crap sell (I see way too many Christian Flags waving alongside the American and Texan flags at the churches here–something I only saw at Assemblies of God congregations and the odd non-denominational church back home). What worries me is the signs in front of the churches that indicate that they’re going towards the “Christian Cool” crowd. What worries me is the fact that these church leaders are dragging those who would seek God and enter the Kingdom of Heaven if they were properly informed down into a consumerist Hell (or, alternately, giving in to the popular whims of the day and losing any kind of doctrine whatsoever).

This was posted originally at my WordPress blog, here.

Today was a good day, even if my driving sucked (I think I almost had 10 accidents today, mostly because I suck at driving).

It started just after 7:00a, when my alarm woke me. I got up, got dressed in my Sunday best, and pointed my car down the Dallas North Tollway to check out a congregation in my continuing survey of Christian worship and search for a church home. Today’s congregation was of the Orthodox Church in America, and the service and congregation were both pretty much what I’ve been seeking. The sheer beauty of the whole thing was sublime. I’m thinking I’m going to seek acceptance in this congregation.

That lasted until about 2:00p, including service, fellowship, and talking with the Metropolitan.

At that time, I pointed my car up Marsh and returned to change and head out to the Irving Anime Club. I was there for their screening until shortly before 5:00. Then, I ran back up MacArthur and onward home. I am exhausted and damn lucky to be alive (as an indictment of my own driving).

This was posted originally at my WordPress blog, here.

I got my own, personal, JesusPhone. Something to take my calls while I’m at the mall.

Yeah, I know, judge me. But my old CrackBerry was giving up the ghost, and it was time. Besides, I’m a Mac user by night, and I couldn’t justify $550 for a Nexus One, but $200 for an iPhone 3Gs was okay. I’m currently putting as much of my music on it as possible, but it’s not the whole collection (which has surprisingly ballooned like crazy–my original iPod could not contain it anymore).

Man, I had no clue I had so much music.

This was posted originally at my WordPress blog, here.

I’ve been off the rim and offline lately. It seems that power problems at home have kept my server off the Internet. It’s okay, I’m back now.

I spent the weekend in San Antonio. There was someone down there that wanted to talk. Thankfully, I won’t be moving: I don’t have the energy or desire to leave Dallas at this time. I’m getting used to work now, though I still feel that I’m underutilized. Besides, other than trains interrupting my YouTube and Hulu viewing patterns, the place I’ve got isn’t too bad, even if it is a bit warm at the moment. Something seems wrong with the air conditioning, and it’s getting warm enough where that’s a necessary thing. I’ll talk to the office tomorrow evening.

I’ll probably be in Houston either this weekend or next. I haven’t decided which it will be.

Oh, and I finally got my census questionnaire sent off. Go procrastination!

This was posted originally at my WordPress blog, here.

I feel like I’m in over my head at work. I don’t have access to revision control, and the guy who’s supposed to let me know about what the URI is for our revision control system keeps blowing off that question. What’s more, I don’t have all the access I need to do my next task, which will involve some reporting work, ensuring that stuff from our ticket system matches our routing information in the database. I would have had a more productive day had my manager been in the office and could talk to him about these issues, but attempts to discuss things with him electronically met with no success. I didn’t get through to him until 4:30, after I left out of sheer frustration.

To top it all off, I’ve got my very own Creature From 8A living downstairs. She’s complained about the noise I’m making twice now, saying that I’m keeping her up. She came up here within two hours of my parents leaving to complain that I had been making too much noise for the entire weekend, ignoring the fact that I had just moved in to the apartment and a large chunk of that noise was me having furniture and belongings dragged up here. I’m seriously afraid to walk around up here, simply because I know she’ll complain. She’s much like my grandmother was 20 years ago: retired, shut in, and going insane.

So to review, no Rock Band, no moving, and work is going in circles already. I know I belong in Carrollton, but something is broken, and I don’t know how to fix it.

This was posted originally at my WordPress blog, here.

So I’ve been here a week now, and honestly, a part of me is getting really homesick. I don’t know that I’ll venture to the Galleria Dallas that much: not only does it seem like a knock-off of The Galleria that doesn’t quite cut it (it feels to be about half the size of The Galleria), but it makes me homesick for the real thing.

I’m also looking for sleeper sofas. I found one at a furniture liquidators in Arlington that I really liked. There’s a pair of similar items that come in a set at The Dump, and if I had an apartment with a study, they’d have been mine last week. I’ve decided against getting a night stand or a linen cabinet, as I’ve got another set of drawers coming from Houston that will fill the role of both quite nicely.

I’ve begun the search for a the best cup of tea that I did not make myself in the Metroplex. If you’re in Houston, I can tell you that you want Té House of Tea in Neartown (and next time I’m down there, which I hope to be next weekend, I will introduce my mom and sister to the place). I found a place called Tea Thyme and Tisane in downtown Carrollton that made a pretty good cup today. About the only thing wrong with it is that it seemed to fall between Té’s informality (which I love) and geniality and the posh and proper upscale tea rooms that are generally more common (which I honestly could do without). Also, they don’t have crepes. In their favor, they did sell individual cups of loose tea, which was a blessing, as I didn’t need a whole small pot. They’re also a lot closer than Teavana, so I won’t have to run all the way to the aforementioned Galleria Dallas to get my own teas. In summary, I need a similar crack team of hipsters, anime fen, freaks, and weirdos to help me out again, but I don’t have them here yet.

One thing I’m struggling with is the fact that there are no regular Howard E. Butt’s grocers around here. If they did, I’d be shopping there. Sure, they have Central Market with about the same distribution as Whole Paycheck Foods, but those don’t sell the store brands. This wouldn’t be a huge concern for most people, but they do make a particular bagel that I’ve come to like. I’ll have to have them shipped from Houston until further notice.

Also, DART doesn’t have a declining balance fare system like Houston METRO does. This makes me sad.

This was posted originally at my WordPress blog, here.

Yeah, it’s a little early, but I had to be here at the apartment to babysit the delivery guys. I finally have a bed¹. If 5:00p weren’t so damn close, I’d head back in to work. In any case, I managed to accomplish everything I wanted to get done today and then some. The take-home lesson here is that Linq is easier to use than ADO.NET.

Also, I had an American staple for the first time today: the leftover meatloaf sandwich. It would have been better had I remembered to bring lettuce, tomato, and spicy brown mustard, but it was still worth eating. Interestingly, I didn’t start eating meatloaf until I started cooking for myself.

We’re going to do some more bloggazing this week. Today, I’m looking at the search terms through which people got to this blog on Google. It appears they’re all looking for this post, where I discuss my attempts at figuring out what the Weight Watchers’ POINTS algorithm is, armed only with their slide rule, a POINTS calculator, and nutrition labels from all sorts of food. They also particularly seem interested in the Roasted Almond Sensation snack bars (the best snack bar ever made, taste-wise), which were introduced last month, probably as a seasonal item².

In fact, the only person coming here that actually dealt in my primary area of expertise (that would be computer programming and software engineering) was looking for “how to write python burned calories formula”. I will admit that I don’t have a script that calculates calories you’ve burned, but if you know the Metabolic equivalent of the Task, you need only multiply that by your mass in kilograms and the length of time you did whatever exercise you performed in hours–the resultant number is how many kilocalories (which are the same as dietary calories) you’ve burned. Honestly, if a machine I’m using tells me how many kilocalories I’ve burned, I divide that by 50 for the Activity POINTS that I’ve earned.

1. I haven’t slept in a bed in a week. It’s murder on my back. My father, on the other hand, loves that kind of arrangement.
2. I know a lot of Weight Watchers members, myself included, that will revolt if they are discontinued.

This was posted originally at my WordPress blog, here.

So my apartment becomes more home-like as time goes by. I’ve got FiOS dragged in here now. I still haven’t gone for a workout yet, and I’m planning on doing that tomorrow.

I’m starting to make plans for this weekend. My next acquisition shall either be a linen cabinet or a sleeper sofa (well, a sleeper loveseat, really). If I were slightly richer, I’d have gotten an apartment with study, but alas. Or perhaps I should invest in a coffee table where I can set my laptop.

I miss sleeping in a bed. I can’t wait until Friday when my new bed gets here.

This was posted originally at my WordPress blog, here.

Well, not really. I’m updating this using my work laptop, which has a 3G card in it.

I’m officially employed. All the paperwork is done, now all I have do do is not screw up. I do, however, need to decide how I’m arranging my benefits, which I believe will come online on the first of the month. Sadly, payday isn’t until the 5th, which means I have bills due before I have money. My parents are willing and able to help me on that, though.

I think I’m going to take some time and review my comments. I get a lot of spam and almost nothing in real comments at WordPress, probably because most people reading this space do so at other locations throughout the Internet (it is relayed multiple times through various sites). Thus, I’m probably responding to spam. If I tagged you as a spammer and you aren’t, please let me know.

I’ve just come across your blog on Bing and to start with I’m loving your layout I agree with what your saying here, your judgment is spot on. I’m sure going to sign up to your rss feed so i can keep informed of furture postings.

Really? I’ve been tracking the analytics on this spot with multiple tools, and nobody has come here through Bing or Live Search. In any case, the layout is the WordPress default. The rest of the site is custom and based on my admittedly limited knowledge of front-end technologies.

Damn, that sound’s so easy if you think about it.

This was in response to the posting where I was talking about the Weight Watcher’s POINTS algorithm. Yes, it’s quite easy when you think about it. Most members, however, don’t.

Have you seen what your site looks like with chrome? It looks a little messed up on mine. Is it just me or?

I’ve tested this site in Chromium and Firefox on Mac and Linux. I haven’t put it through its paces on any Windows platform quite yet.

I found this blog by searching on Google for hotel marketing. How did you optimize your site to rank so high in the search engine results?

This comes to us from my Christmas post when I was in Arlington. Again, my analytics software does not indicate anyone has come here looking for information about hotel marketing information for the Arlington area. In fact, I’ve only ever been in Arlington on two occasions: a trip during the summer of 1996 and the Christmas of 2009. I was about to say that I’ve only been in the Arlington area twice, but that’s a lie, as human readers of this space should know.

Happy New Years!! To my favorite blog, hopefully tactical body armor was not needed with all those morons shooting their shotguns above residential housing.

I’m glad to hear that I’m your favorite blog. And no, body armor was unnecessary. This was actually amongst the more unique spam postings, as they did manage to work the product they were hawking into the text organically and somewhat amusingly.

There were other postings in the comment queue as well: one person was advertising a camgirl site or something and several comments that were obviously randomly generated characters.