Month: June 2002

STOP PROBING ME!

Garrett Knights warned me of this, but it’s still bad to see it first hand. Apparently, the set of IP addresses Telus assigns to its’ ADSL subscribers is well-known. How can I tell? I’ve been probed over 7 times in last two hours. My last ISP was not well-known so their IP addresses were not as public. It was so safe, I uninstalled my firewall because I didn’t need it.

Now, I’m getting probes from France all to the way to Korea. They’re testing my ports, looking for weaknesses. I’m not sure what they could do.

I’m going to leave ZoneAlarm running for a while to see what it can find.

BACK ON ADSL

Well, after over a week of not having ADSL, I am finally back on. I’m not sure what crack withdrawal feels like but I think I have a pretty good idea.

Meanwhile, the new place is a mess. I have boxes everywhere and no place to put them. I tempted not to put them anywhere since I’ll be moving out soon anyways.

The internet though, you have to have the Internet man.

The view from this window overlooks a decrepit, low rent apartment block. I’m thinking about installing a web cam so that I can share.

Enter shirtless guy holding a beer

“I didn’t hit ‘er offisur!”

Enter woman with big hair holding filthy child

“He done it ’cause he loves me sir!”

How can I not share this with the world?

MOVING DAY

It’s late, I’m tired, I should be in bed, but I need to be up for a few more minutes yet. The house is quiet, but it’s almost empty. The walls are bare, and many rooms are devoid of furnishings. Tomorrow, I’m moving the rest of my stuff to a tiny townhouse. My parent’s townhouse. My mom has decided she doesn’t want to deal with mortgage payments anymore. That’s fine, but I get the feeling my parents didn’t expect to have their 28 year old son with them in the grand scheme of things. Ha ha ha. Well, that’s what I get for deviating from an engineering career (what a sacrifice I made for you EA! lol).

I’ll miss this house. We moved in right when I started university, which was the most important chapter in my life. My memories of school and this house go hand in hand. That’s odd, because I lived in residence while at UBC. There are many others reasons why I loved this house. When he moved in, this house was brand spanking new, untouched by any family. It actually looked shiny. We came from a house that was over 25 years old at the time. It had only one bathroom, the new place had three. Our old house didn’t have a garage, the new place had a two car garage (with an electric door opener, something which my parents had never had). The old place was small, the new place had more room that we knew what to do with (my mom eventually solved that problem by buying new furniture). The old place had crappy appliances, the new place had a refrigerator that made ice on demand! The old place had one ancient phone jack in the most inconvenient place, the new place had a phone jack in almost every room.

Of course over a span of ten years, you form many other memories as well. With so much new space, a lot of family was able to visit. Almost all my cousins came over to stay, some for even extended periods of time. I also remember watching a lot of the Canucks games in the house during their run to the Cup in ’94. Strangely, one of my fondest memories consists of putting together a new barbeque in the middle of the kitchen floor on a hot Saturday evening. My sister was watching Pulp Fiction on TV and she was listening to me swear as I got all sweaty when the legs of the bbq wouldn’t fit together. I remember getting DSL in ’99 and the thrill of having the Internet on all the time.

It’s all the little slices of life that happened in this house that I will take with me. Can a house feel like a part of a family? I certainly think so.

Well, I’m rambling so I’ll end it here. Let’s hope everything goes smoothly. I should have the DSL back up on Tuesday. I’ll be back then.

IS THAT SO THONG?

Undoubtedly, if you’re a guy you’ve noticed the proliferation of these low slung jeans that young women are wearing. They ride really low on the hip. Women who wear these jeans invariably see fit to also have thong underwear underneath. How can you tell? It’s obvious when these women sit down. The jeans are low, and the straps of the thong sit high on the waist. Combine those two and you got some entertainment.

I was at the Lougheed Mall food court yesterday. As I made my way to KF… I mean the sandwich place, I saw this attractive woman at one of the tables. She was wearing the abeforementioned combination. I could plainly see the top of her pink satin thong above her jeans.

As I walked past, I thought, “Cool!”. Then, as I lined up for my bucket of chi… I mean BLT, I wondered is that really cool? Wouldn’t I be better off not seeing her thong? These women are plainly hot and there’s almost no chance in hell I’d ever snag any of them. By showing me a tantalizing piece of their underwear, isn’t that just mean? Aren’t they just saying, “Hey, have a tiny peek at my thong, nice huh? That’s as close as you’ll ever get… ha ha ha!”.

Now, had I not seen that food court thong, I would have turned my attention to getting fries… I mean a salad with my BLT. Wouldn’t ignorance be bliss in this case?

As I tossed the bones aside from my BLT, my thoughts changed though. No, I concluded, it is wrong to not want to glance at thong. Rather than view it as a taunt, I should view it as a gift, a bonus if you will. If these hot women are willing to show a little off, then we should appreciate what we are given.

End of story.

By the way, most men probably have already come to the same conclusion, and done it much faster too, but this is me.

T U L S A ? ? ?

I just checked my logs, and some one from Tulsa, Oklahoma visited today. This person appears to have bookmarked my site, since they bypassed my intro. I don’t know anyone from Tulsa. Who are you?

If you are reading this, contact me here.

H I N D S I G H T

Today I did more packing. I came across a few packages I received shortly before I graduated from UBC in 1997. They were from five universities in Canada. Each one wanted me to do my graduate studies with them. Almost all of them were offering financial support.

At the time, I thought it was too soon, and I wanted to travel. I wonder though now, perhaps I could deferred their offers for a year, and started grad studies in 1999. It’s hard not to think about it now, as I scramble to see where my funding will come from this fall.

I could spend the entire afternoon thinking about where I’d be now had I accepted any of those offers. That wouldn’t be healthy though.

Hmmm… I better get back to packing and cleaning.

D I A L – U P != F U N

How did we surf the Internet with these damn things before? I can’t believe I have to wait until the 11th to get my ADSL back.

I WANT A LIGHTSABER

I can’t seem to get these things out of my mind. I’m totally geeking out on this. It’s an elegant weapon with a blade of pure energy. It makes a cool humming noise when it’s on. It makes an even cooler noise when you swing it. It can deflect blaster bolts. It can cut through blast doors.

I’ve seen a lot of movies. I’ve seen a lot of movie fights. The best ever fights are lightsaber ones. Just take a look here. The flash of the blades, the voom sound as they cut through the air, and inherent deadliness of the weapon, it all makes for very good entertainment.

I had a meeting with my two supervising professors today. We were discussing possible projects that had haptic interface design ramifications. All I could think about was, “Can I make a lightsaber for my master’s degree?”.

Wow, I’m such a geek. 😉

Ok, someone has to tell me where to find one of these in the Lower Mainland.