The infusion of amateur (read: unpaid) Web comic artists in the last five or so years has helped reinvigorate daily comics, at least for the Internet-savvy (who can now indulge in theme-specific and esoteric comics that would never make it in a newspaper world of "target demographics").

It also increases the competition. How much does it suck for a nationally syndicated 20-year veteran when his comic is done three days earlier by a Web comic artist?

Labels: comics, funny, social commentary

The weather here is experiencing a moderate case of dissociative identity disorder (it's not called "multiple personality disorder" anymore, kids), alternating in three-day increments between rain, frost, wind and 70-degree sun. In other words, it's a typical Nebraska year.

But to wish everyone a happy Spring anyway, a few cheery Spring-ish photos.

Labels: environment, photography

Here's one to horrify my mother. I've always liked Dana Delaney (probably because "China Beach" was my mother's favorite show for awhile). I read an interview on Sunday about her tendency to date much younger men. That means if I'd played my cards right, my mother could be thrilled to actually meet one of her favorite actresses while simultaneously horrified that I was dating someone my mother's age.

That'd be a fun Christmas.

Labels: amusement, entertainment

Labels: what the hell

Earth Day pictures are finally up. Enjoy.

Labels: friends, fun, humanity, omaha, photography

Lisa and I were talking about galaxy collisions last night (or perhaps more accurately, I was talking about galaxy collisions and Lisa was politely nodding, 'cause I'm a geek), specifically the impending (in 3 billion years or so) conjugation of the Andromeda galaxy with our own. And almost on cue NASA releases some Hubble images showcasing merging galaxies (fantastic pictures, really).

Labels: science, wonder

*sigh*

Labels: annoyance, politics

A choice sampling of photos taken with a pair of more-or-less cooperative twins (Alec is very "posing" friendly; Kylie less so).

Labels: alec, kyle, photography, twins

From an Omaha Craig's List post today, advertising a "cut rate" wedding photographer (likely someone like me who does photography as a hobby and is trying to break into full-time photography by offering "not quite professional" work for a fraction of the regular price):

I think that photographer should importance of your special day as if they were your family . . . I have helped many family and friends with a creating wedding event pictures . . . Wedding events and everything experienced throughout the day can be such a blur with recalling it several months later . . .

I'm pretty forgiving of spoken errors, given the pressures and time constraints of immediate replies; I'm far less charitable toward catastrophic language breakdown in printed material. While I'm not one, despite my unfortunate and usually concealed pretentious penchants, to engage in the ego-feeding activity of unsolicited grammar correction, I'm not above judging a person's professional qualifications based upon his or her "best foot forward." In other words, if language is not your area of expertise, ask a friend to proofread your literature before presenting it to potential clients. (Lest I appear *too* discouraging, I do wish the poster the best of luck; I can empathize with the plight of the "not quite professional" photographer.)

Labels: proofreading

Additional video from that outing available here, courtesy of Flickr's new video option.

Labels: alec, kyle, twins, video

It's Earth Day in Omaha. Head on down to Elmwood Park. :)

Labels: environment, omaha

This "water in the basement" thing is becoming something of an annoying recurrence. The weather is supposed to be nice this weekend, so I imagine some new silicone caulking and gutter cleaning is in order, along with some surveying to see if pouring a small patch of concrete "sidewalk" along the northwest corner will (a) fix the problem and (b) not be a tremendous hassle. It probably wouldn't be *quite* the annoyance (since I don't have carpet in the basement and the water just puddles until I push it into the not-quite-as-low-as-the-lowest-spot-in-the-floor drain), except that my first warning of it every time is when I stumble into the basement to take my shower and step on the soaking wet and very cold door mat at the foot of the stairs (that and the fact that years of this have pretty severely damaged the plaster walls it "flows under" to get from the wall behind my furnace all the way to the lowest point of the floor).

To cheer me up in advance (as if he knew my basement was going to be wet today . . .), Cris sent me this.

Labels: annoyance, funny, house

Labels: amusement, politics

For the past few weeks I've been watching various sites for Canon lens deals so I can upgrade from my current walk-around lens. On Friday the following ad popped up on the local Craig's List board:

"Canon EOS 5D 12.8 Megapixel w/ EF 24-105 Kit- $1100"

Right of the bat this seemed odd to me. The poster was advertising it as "like new," having only used it for "50 shots" before deciding he didn't need a full-frame camera. The language in the ad actually showed some degree of knowledge of cameras, but at the same time he's asking $1,100 for a nearly $3,000 camera. The lens alone is worth what he was asking for the package.

So I passed. I did forward it to Lisa with a joke about how I'd give her my XTi for free if she'd buy me this one, but other than that I forgot about it.

On Saturday afternoon it was still there, and I finally broke down and sent a query about the condition and original purchase point (no harm there). As usual, I used one of my "throw away" e-mail addresses so in case it *was* a scam I could just junk the e-mail address when I started receiving spam from it. No response came on Saturday, and within about three hours the ad was removed from Craig's List. I figured the seller had found a buyer and removed the ad to keep from receiving further inquiries.

Fast forward to this morning (Monday), when I receive the following:

> -------Original Message-------
> From: Robert Armes
> To: [my throw-away craigslist.org address]
> Subject: Canon EOS 5D 12.8 Megapixel w/ EF 24-105 Kit- $1100
> Sent: 14 Apr '08 13:14
>
> Hi there,
>
> I still have the Kit. But the thing is that i'm in the U.K. for my
> school ( i have the gear with me), if you're still interested in the sale
> please let me know and maybe we can work something out . So drop me a line
> if you're up for grabs!
> Thank you!
>
>
> Robert Armes
> 420, Prescot Rd, Old Swan, Liverpool, Merseyside L13 3DA
> United Kingdom
> Ph: 44 20 3014 7453

Alarm bells. First off, he didn't answer any of my questions. Second, he's suddenly in England, two days after advertising on an Omaha posting board? For school (a long-term obligation)? Why even bother to advertise it here? Third, now we're talking shipping charges, which defeats the purpose of Craig's List (local buying and selling) and introduces the potential for scams and fraud.

So I Googled his name and a few other pieces of information from the e-mail. It took less than 15 seconds to come up with a Flickr discussion board with posts from people who have received the exact same offer (using the same name and address) on the Craig's List boards of Seattle and Chicago. Some of the contributors to the board pursued it further than I did and had received instructions for sending payment through a faked-but-authentic-sounding shipping company.

Just a reminder that things that sound too good to be true probably are.

Labels: amusement, computers, internet, photography, social commentary

It's mid-April in Nebraska, and of course that means slowly greening lawns, the return of birds and bugs . . . and 8 inches of snow in my home county. According to one dedicated reporter (my mother), all the roads are closed.

Labels: western nebraska

To most people, the lines of code that make up a computer program are meaningless symbols. To make computer threats more "personal," digital artist Alex Dragulescu has used the code of a variety of viruses and spyware programs to render unique three-dimensional images that add a "face" to the programs' names. His next project, an even more interesting venture, will use a person's blog and other online projects to create a three-dimensional "picture" of that person's online life.

Labels: art, computers, cool, internet

Things I learned this weekend:

- If you let a toddler crawl on her hands and knees on the pavement in new shoes, it scrapes the leather off the toes (which makes parental units somewhat unhappy).

- Twins can become addicted to turning over stones in the backyard once they learn to spot the centipedes and earthworms.

- "Lane's Cheerios" is colorful two-year-old language for "Count Chocula." Offering them regular Cheerios will earn protests. And oddly, Alec picks the marshmallows out and gives them away (those are the best part . . .).

- No matter how much your nose itches while you're shaving, don't scratch it with the electric razor . . .

Labels: miscellany, twins

I've had two conversations two nights in a row with two different people (both of whom know me fairly well, not just random coworkers or anything) that have both ended with me in a kind of shocked bewilderment when the other person said something along the lines of "I'm incredibly upset that you would say that about me." As the only common denominator between the two, I'm obviously the problem, but for the life of me I can't figure out what's going on. It has me rather frustrated and more than a little paranoid (very Mr. Darcy-ish, I assure you).

Labels: introspection, stress

Even a casual perusal of my blog will touch upon my secular preferences, although I think I've done an admirable job of being the antithesis of the "militant atheist" so often denigrated in the common memetic circles.

As of late, however, I've really felt that something was missing. Something beyond physical stasis, perhaps some form of consensus reality where the dreams and beliefs of humanity shape existence. I dunno. In any case, I've decided to give Scientology a go; I remember that "exploding volcano" commercial for Dianetics when I was a kid and it's always seemed to have some commonsense appeal to it. I've looked for an Omaha chapter of the Church of Scientology without much luck (just some links to a defunct chapter), so I've had to sign up via the Internet. But the introductory packets arrived last week, so I should have some interesting homework for awhile.

And just in case you're still reading and are very confused, Happy April Fool's Day. :)

Labels: amusement, holiday