Disorderly Content

Just in time for Passover, a colleague sends me this reduced version of the holiday seder. Be assured that nothing of importance has been omitted:

The Two Minute Haggadah

A Passover service for the impatient.

Opening prayers:

Thanks, God, for creating wine. (Drink wine.)

Thanks for creating produce. (Eat parsley.)

Overview: Once we were slaves in Egypt. Now we're free. That's why we're doing this.

Four questions:

1. What's up with the matzoh?
2. What's the deal with horseradish?
3. What's with the dipping of the herbs?
4. What's this whole slouching at the table business?

Answers:

1. When we left Egypt, we were in a hurry. There was no time for making decent bread.
2. Life was bitter, like horseradish.
3. It's called symbolism.
4. Free people get to slouch.

A funny story:
Once, these five rabbis talked all night, then it was morning. (Heat soup now.)

The four kinds of children and how to deal with them:
Wise child - explain Passover.
Simple child - explain Passover slowly.
Silent child - explain Passover loudly.
Wicked child - browbeat in front of the relatives.
Speaking of children: We hid some matzoh. Whoever finds it gets five bucks.

The story of Passover: It's a long time ago. We're slaves in Egypt. Pharoah is a nightmare. We cry out for help. God brings plagues upon the Egyptians. We escape, bake some matzoh. God parts the Red Sea. We make it through; the Egyptians aren't so lucky. We wander 40 years in the desert, eat manna, get the Torah, wind up in Israel, get a new temple, enjoy several years without being persecuted again. (Let brisket cool now.)

The 10 plagues: Blood, Frogs, Lice - you name it.

The singing of "Dayenu":
If got had gotten us out of Egypt and not punished our enemies, it would have been enough.

If he'd punished our enemies and not parted the Red Sea, it would have been enough.

If he'd parted the Red Sea... (Remove gefilte fish from refrigerator now.)

Eat matzoh. Drink more wine. Slouch.

Thanks again, God, for everything.

SERVE MEAL.

Jeeze, that didn't take long at all! I've been on MySpace for all of two weeks and already I'm under attack! Early this morning I had two new friend requests, both with photos so professionally perfect that I knew they were some form of con. But of course I wanted to be sure, or maybe I just wanted to see in what form the con would present itself. So I clicked on the profile to get a splash screen I hadn't encountered before:

This profile contains adult content.
CLICK HERE to install MS Viewer.

The link above takes you to an image on Flickr. It's perfectly safe, unlike the real thing which installs a trojan that does untold damage. Or it might have, if I weren't on a Mac and unable (and unwilling) to run Windows executables. So once more I breathe a sigh of relief, feel just a teeny bit smug and then wonder if I should reconsider my views on the death penalty. For spammers and scammers like this, maybe the good of society would be served by extreme prejudice.

I've had enough jobs (okay, more than my share) to know that there are bosses from hell, there are mismatches between employer and employee, and then there are situations where the world is collapsing around you and things just suck. So I don't take sides automatically when I hear about what one participant claims is an injustice. Still...

The blogosphere (do we still call it that?) had news a few days ago about a blogger who was fired for blogging. That was followed a day later by a post written by his former employer, giving his reasons for the termination. Which seemed weird to me; I'm used to employers not saying a word in public. (What they tell the remaining employees may or may not bear any resemblance to reality, but to the outside world they keep quiet.) So I was already feeling both uncomfortable and suspicious. And now we have the response of the ex-employee. Having worked at both large firms and small ones, and having once been terminated with extreme prejudice, as the spy novels say (although I don't mean it in that way) by a manager who was less than a model of honor or responsibility or honesty (when a marketing/sales guy keeps using the phrase "I am an honest man", you can bet your bottom dollar he isn't), I know which side I believe. It probably doesn't help that the firm at the heart of this He Said/He Said debate is called Mercenary...

Pulled from MySpace, and presented without comment:

One of the annoying aspects of shooting with a digital SLR, as compared both to point & shoot cameras and those film SLRs of fond memory, is the need to, and the impossibility of, keeping the camera's sensor clean. The problem comes from what makes an SLR so good: the ability to replace lenses. But changing lenses means exposing the camera's sensor to the elements, even if only for a moment. And that means all kinds of evil stuff: dust, rain, even little plasticy bits that can break free from the camera's innards after a little too much rough handling. Which leads, inevitably, to crud on the sensor that a dry cleaning won't get off.

(If you're wondering why film SLRs don't have the same problem, it's because the sensor -- the film -- gets pushed through the camera and brushes against something that cleans it. Besides, each frame of film only gets used once, so any junk becomes irrelevant with the next press of the shutter.)

Anyway, I knew it was time to investigate a wet process cleaning when I saw these dark streaks on some of my airplane-in-flight pictures. The streaks weren't a problem if the thing I was focusing on was relatively close. But at the distant range of my 300mm lens they were becoming steadily more obvious, and steadily harder to clone away in Photoshop. So off I went to Keeble to see what they recommended for a cleaning solution (pun fully intended).

What I got was a surprise. The last time I'd asked about cleaning, they told me they didn't do that kind of work, that I'd have to buy a kit and do it myself. But some time between then and now they'd had a change of heart, presumably deciding the risk of their doing damage was low (the reason given for not cleaning customers' sensors before) and the chance for income wasn't. So I gave them my precious(ssss), and waited an agonizing two days for the verdict. Which was positive: my camera had cleaned up just fine (wish the same could be said for me) and was ready for pickup. Now I just needed a chance to get out and try it out.

Which is what I did today, first heading up by San Francisco Airport to catch the planes coming in to land, then over to a public garden in Palo Alto to see if spring had yet... ummm... sprung. Which it had, or at least enough for me to try out my new macro lens. And thence home, to see if my pictures were well and truly streak free. To make a long story short (yeah, I know: too late), they were. And are. And I'm gonna revise my lens changing technique in an attempt to keep them that way as long as I can. Two days without a camera's just not right!

Late to the game as ever. In this case the game is MySpace, as overhyped a web venture as ever there was. So why am I suddenly investigating the dubious pleasures of yet another Rupert Murdoch property? Blame my friend Barry, who dragged me kicking and screaming to help him figure out how to connect with all those potential thriller readers. After all, if they insist on reading, why not something good?

So here I am. Or, to be more accurate, there I am. And as friendless as ever. Which is why the plaintive plea at the start of this post. If you're on MySpace, won't you make me your friend? Poor Barry's looking awful lonely as my one and only friend.

I've been dreading doing my taxes this year. Part of it, I suppose, is the added complexity of my website income, my stock photo income, that little win I had in Laughlin, Nevada in December; all those things were fun when the money came in, but not quite so much fun when some of it has to go out. But the biggest hassle relates to SGI, my former employer who cancelled all of my stock in December. That means it's worthless for anything but wallpapering an outhouse. It also means capital loss deductions for the next several years, assuming I can figure out the cost basis for all those ten year old shares. It's further complicated by the way SGI divested itself of MIPS Computer; each share of SGI turned into some fractional share in MIPS, which changes the basis for all those old shares. And the accounting program I used back then is long since obsolete, as are the OS (Mac OS 9) and processor (PowerPC) it ran on. I do still have a PPC-based Mac, but the thought of bringing up OS9 and digging for the data doesn't appeal.

Fortunately we have the Web. And, for the thousandth time this month, how did we survive before the Web? A quick search got me the prices and the percentage breakdown for that stock calculation. And another search got me the (deductable) Vehicle License Fee amount for my new car. Can't get it off the registration renewal if the car's too new to need renewal, can I?

So, a couple of hours later, I think I have most everything entered and calculated. I might have missed one stock purchase, so I guess I'll have to power up the old PowerBook and look at those old accounts after all. But it could have been a lot worse, even if I do still get angry every time I think of SGI's abandonment of its stockholders. At least after this year I won't have any reason to think about SGI stock. That's something.

I've never been a fan of Best Buy; my occasional visit there makes me look on Fry's Electronics with favor. But that was mostly over their sales tactics and the general competence of their staff. (Geek Squad, take note: it takes more than dressing like a loser to make you a computer nerd.) There's a difference between being pushy and outright dishonesty. And Best Buy? You've stepped way over the line.

I refer to stories over the past few days about Best Buy's shadow web site, an inside-the-store copy of the corporate site that has higher prices than the one they show the outside world. As I understand it, the scam (and I select that word carefully) goes like this: customer comes into the store, expecting the same good deal they saw on the web. Employee brings up the item, which shows a higher price. "Gee, " employee says, "guess the price went up." And customer, assuming he doesn't want to come away empty handed, accepts the explanation and pays the higher price.

The story ends with the statement that Best Buy has "failed to give clear answers" about the purpose of the phony site. Yeah, that ought to be a good story, assuming they can maintain a poker face. I'm betting not.

There's a song we sing at Passover (well, we used to sing; I haven't been to a Passover seder in years) called "Dayenu". It translates to "It would have been enough", and recounts all the things God did for the Israelites in their trials in and then escape from Yul Brynner in The Ten Commandments. The point of the song being, if God'd done just this much and no more, it would have been enough. But he didn't, which leads to the next verse.

I mention this because it came to mind as I thought of all my troubles during this week's business trip to that flower of the Midwest, Cedar Rapids, Iowa. Going to Iowa in winter might strike you as the height of lunacy. Yeah, me too. But it's not like it was my idea.

So what went wrong, but could have been a lot worse? Well, it started when I booked my flight a few days earlier. The only seat choices on the long outbound from San Francisco to St. Louis were middle seats. So I decided not to select a seat. After all, how much worse could it get? (Foolish question. The answer: a middle seat in the rear of the plane and a connection time measured in small numbers of minutes. Do the math.) Anyway, that meant that when I got to the airport, I had to get in line to try to get a seat assignment. Along with crowds of other people, most of whom were trying to make alternate flight arrangements due to delays, missed (or soon to be missed) connections or outright cancellations. Thanks to my AAdvantage Gold status on American, I got to use the First Class line. It took just 45 minutes to get to an agent, compared to over two hours for people in the regular line. But no joy; they still couldn't assign me a seat. So off I went through security and over to the gate, where I discovered my flight was delayed.

Eventually we were boarded. And had to wait; it seems our real flight crew was late arriving from another flight. But we took off, made okay time and got to St. Louis a few minutes before my Cedar Rapids flight was scheduled to leave. But not to worry, I thought; given the choice of holding the last flight of the night or paying for a hotel for me (and, I assumed, others), American would hold the flight. Which they did. An hour later I was in Cedar Rapids. And discovered that my bag wasn't.

But it could have been worse. Fortunately, I had a change of clothes in my carryon. And I begged the American rep for a toiletry kit to replace the one in my checked bag, may the UK terrorist plotters rot in hell. So I was covered for the moment, and if it took longer than a day for my bag to be found and delivered, I could use the hotel laundry and/or buy an extra outfit or two.

I was awakened at 6:45 the next morning by my phone. Turns out my customer contact had developed a bad cold and wouldn't be available to work with me. I was informed there was no one there to replace him, which meant cooling my heels for the day. Oh, and the hotel's Internet access, which wasn't working when I arrived, still wasn't working. Which caused a panic among my cohorts at The ScapeCast, who needed me to record and upload a couple of pieces for the next episode of our podcast, but hadn't gotten the text to me before I left home. All of which meant a pretty boring and useless day. But, as I said, it could have been worse. I had a change of clothes, the hotel had power (which had been out all over town the day before I arrived and was still out for thousands of people in the area) and I had an iPod full of entertainment. And both the hotel WiFi and my errant bag arrived that day. Things were looking up.

I'll spare you the details of the work part of the trip, in part because my employer wouldn't appreciate having their business discussed in this forum. So let's jump to the day of my return flight. I woke up, got ready and then examined the bill the hotel had slid under my door. Problem. Turns out I'd prepaid the room on Orbitz, but they'd charged me anyway. So I had a nice conversation with the desk clerk, who had no record of the Orbitz prepay. Fortunately, I was able to use the hotel WiFi to show her both my reservation email and the credit card charge. Unfortunately, she didn't have the authority to make the correction. Her manager, who did, wasn't due in for another hour or two. Fortunately, I was able to print both documents to PDF files and put them on a flash drive, so she could print them as evidence. And, from the call I received later, it was sorted out.

After a quick breakfast and a fuel stop for the car, I got to Eastern Iowa Airport more than two hours early. I turned in my car and got in line for the counter just seconds before an agent put a Cancelled sign next to my flight. Fortunately, there was a flight an hour and change earlier that: a) had room; and b) was delayed to just about when mine was supposed to leave. So while I waited, I decided to tackle another credit card problem I'd noticed when I was looking for the hotel charge. It seemed my last cell phone bill was about double what it should have been, the result of three strange looking charges that date back to my trip to southeastern Arizona in January. I got on the phone with Cingular, discovered that they were three six minute calls to Malaysia, swore that I've never called Malaysia in my life, and have never made an international call from my cell, and had the charges reversed. Then I waited. And waited. And eventually we boarded. And rolled over to the runway. And waited. And waited. Finally we got clearance to head for Chicago. Where I discovered that my SFO-bound flight was about as far as you can get in the American terminal area (G12 to K18, in case you were curious). Checking another monitor along the way, I noticed what I'd missed: an hour and a half delay. So I took the time to get on the phone with American to find out why my upgrade request didn't show up on their system (no joy, although I later learned that making the request isn't enough; you have to renew the request at the gate to prove you really, really meant it - and no, I didn't get the upgrade) and then headed back to the gate to see if there was an agent to talk to. Only to discover that we'd changed gates; K18 had become H6. (Which isn't as bad as going back to G concourse.) So I went in search of some lunch, since they don't feed you on flights any more, had a really mediocre burrito (Mexican food in the Midwest? Always a bad idea) and sat down to wait for the flight.

Eventually we boarded, where I found myself next to a young mother and her eight month old offspring. Which turned out not to be a problem at all; said child was playful and happy for most of the flight, and even pretty quiet when she got cranky. So aside from being trapped in a little tin can for five hours (the wait for the runway was the usual O'Hare in bad weather experience), it wasn't awful.

And that was mostly it. I got off the plane, got my bag pretty quickly, got a shuttle to the garage that had my car and drove home. And it only took fourteen hours door to door. As I say, it could have been worse.

I'm typing from Eastern Iowa Airport, waiting, nay, hoping for a flight to Chicago and then home to the Left Coast. One benefit of Cedar Rapids (there may be others; I couldn't say) is free WiFi at the airport, which makes the waiting and the wondering a little less tedious. I even found a wall with a bunch of outlets, so I don't have to worry about battery life. But I digress.

Anyway, after leaving my hotel I went looking for a gas station. I always fill up the rental car, rather than sticking my employer with the $6 a gallon the rental agency charges to do it. Imagine my surprise when I saw that premium unleaded was ten cents a gallon cheaper than regular. At first I thought it was a mistake at that station. But the next station I went to (how can I trust a station that can't even get its prices right?) was the same deal. So I filled up and wondered what the heck was going on.

Arriving at Hertz, I asked the guy checking me in about the strange pricing. "We're in corn country," he explained. Apparently, premium is an ethanol blend in these parts. And to encourage the use of ethanol, the state doesn't tax it the way they do petroleum products. Hence the good stuff being cheaper than the cheap stuff.

Don't you feel better for knowing that?