Lookout honey, ‘cuz I’m using technology.
My computer friend was having troubles with his girlfriend, and I tried to offer him a bit of advice: in Unix, chmod is used to set permissions for which users can access the file, with 7 granting access to everyone.
…which means I inadvertently made his girlfriend a whore.
I’m a PHP developer, and I am going to out myself as a naïve n00b by saying I’ve never had a problem with writing applications for it. Yes, I may even enjoy programming in PHP. This is why I’m linking to an article Jeff at Coding Horror wrote on why PHP Sucks, But It Doesn’t Matter.
The TIOBE community index I linked above? It’s written in PHP. Wikipedia, which is likely to be on the first page of anything you search for these days? Written in PHP. Digg, the social bookmarking service so wildly popular that a front page link can crush the beefiest of webservers? Written in PHP. WordPress, arguably the most popular blogging solution available at the moment? Written in PHP. YouTube, the most widely known video sharing site on the internet? Written in PHP. Facebook, the current billion-dollar zombie-poking social networking darling of venture capitalists everywhere? Written in PHP.
Notice a pattern here?
Architecture astronauts may have a problem with the language, but the fact is PHP is getting the job done. Now Javascript on the other hand — scattered documentation, poor debugging support, the OO-over designing pitfalls. I don’t see how anyone can get anything done with it. Some people can, but not me.
I, um, blame the tools.
Just feeling a little pleased with myself. I recently started a programming job that has thus far been woefully short on programming. I haven’t even been given the right tools for the job: BBEdit, Photoshop, Transmit, or any of the other developer accoutrements I’m accustomed to. Like a Mac.
Just to show how nothing ever changes for me, I was given a super-rush last-minute project that needed to be done TODAY. The design spec was a photocopy with a few scribbles. With only the tools that came with my office PC, I was able to code up the project using: WordPad, Paint, and some freeware FTP. And I still got the thing together to demo in under an hour!
Just feeling a little pleased with myself.
It was 2001 when my friend Nick and I wrote our first (and only) cartoon about the sardonic, ever-suffering super hero The Sarcastic Hulk. And over the last two years I had been living that cartoon. I’m so damned observant I only needed my friend Lisa to point it out. You tell me if there are any similarities between a certain mild-mannered workaday tool and the jaded giant:
And most of all…
Talk about life imitating art! If only someone had kept writing these I may have had some warning. Oh wait. But what gets me is I didn’t see this situation coming and I wrote it.*
*I will catch endless hell from one Nick Shaheen if I don’t mention that he also wrote the script, and that I’m an ass for taking out all his best jokes. Nick, nobody was going to get a joke about Meredith Baxter-Berney.
I can’t remember when I last slept! I had been cooped up in my apartment writing code all night, and when the sun began to shine through my mini-blinds I knew I wasn’t going to get any sleep now, since that’s exactly what happened yesterday morning. So I grabbed my ipod and went for a walk.
I headed down Santa Monica listening to Rebel Rebel when I caught my reflection in a guitar shop window. I’ve been letting my hair grow out, I was bedraggled, hadn’t shaved in days, and hid my eyes behind dark sunglasses. I looked and felt like a rockstar. And as I headed down the sunny side of the street at 8:30 this morning to destinations unknown, the commuter traffic was beginning to pile up. The people who had to go to sleep at a sensible hour, only to drag themselves out of bed to get into their car and sit in traffic on their way to another day at their hateful job. More grist for the mill. And I was out taking a walk, enjoying the morning sunshine. I never felt so free.
When I was working, I had that I couldn’t sleep I couldn’t sleep I couldn’t sleep insomnia gnawing at me, but this time it was different. It wasn’t the insomnia that was bothering me, it was the anxiety about when I had to wake up. Now I don’t have to sleep. I felt like I had finally found my own schedule, and it felt wonderful.
This isn’t me looking for pity. I know that most peoples’ lives are 80% bullshit not of their own doing, but as a person who should by all accounts be in control of his own destiny I thought this would be a clear demonstration of where I mislaid my priorities.
Some Haiku I wrote during this afternoon’s meeting to describe what I do at work:
“Where are the listings
on laweekly.com?!”
That’s my handiwork!
Come in after 10:00
rewrite that thing with no spec
then leave around 5:00
Listmaster’s a mess
Reader Management is too –
Look how things have changed!
I had a great time in Toronto at this year’s Mobifest. Toronto’s a wonderful city and I would definitely go back. Sorry it took me roughly three weeks to say that. I met some great people, made some connections and got to see some fun videos and animation, but more than that, I learned one important thing: that guy running karaoke at the Holiday Inn was a huge asshole.
I enjoyed the Mobifest show itself (up until the awards part anyway) and I could see in each short what made it stand out to the judges. And it’s true, you do learn a bit about what works and what doesn’t from watching your video with an audience… like sometimes you can be too clever for your own good. I’m not saying that to sound arrogant, I mean that trying too hard to reinvent a tired story, or abstracting something to the point of obscurity, or just having too many things going on at once, you may just trip over your own feet. From that, here are a few things I learned about producing mobile content:
Continue reading ‘Toronto karaoke DJs: the worst people in the world?’
And I only sleep when I’m awake. It’s Friday and I had a dream that was more vivid and engaging than anything that has happened to me during this dull, gray week. I only retained this insight for the brief moment after I woke up, before my mind switched off in preparation for going about my rote, insipid tasks. I’m waiting for the tipping point wherein I fully recede into the dream world and leave this grim, featureless shadoworld behind.
So if you see me and I don’t see you back, I’m not being rude, I’m dreaming.
(Also, I’ve been taking in a lot of PKD and shrooms lately …but this is probably incidental.)
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